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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28873215">cosmogony</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/pajama_sama/pseuds/pajama_sama'>pajama_sama</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Destiny (Video Games)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Action/Adventure, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Study, Comfort/Angst, Ensemble Cast, F/M, Friendship/Love, Gen, Memory Loss, Multi, Past Lives, Past Relationship(s), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Romance, Slow Burn, Spoilers, Survivor Guilt, Very Lore-Heavy And Author Is Sorry</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-05-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 06:54:56</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>39</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>39,556</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28873215</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/pajama_sama/pseuds/pajama_sama</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i></i>
</p><div class="center">
  <p>
    <br/>
    <i>A lorebook-style collection of vignettes spanning from the Collapse to Beyond Light.</i>
  </p>
  <div class="center"></div>
</div><div class="center">
  <p>--</p>
</div>One day, a Guardian walks into Crow's life, and just… doesn't leave. This grim stranger is oddly sympathetic, and seems dead-set on freeing him from Spider—at any and all costs.<p>He has no way of knowing this is far from the first time they've met.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Crow &amp; Glint, Female Guardian &amp; Ghost (Destiny), Female Guardian/Crow, Female Guardian/Uldren Sov, Uldren Sov/Original Character(s)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>120</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>138</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. INTRODUCTION & LEGEND.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>hello, reader(s)! welcome to <strong>cosmogony</strong>.</p><p>my adhd ass decided that fixating on the fact that the corsairs recognize an awoken guardian was a perfect pastime. and then the latest season of the hunt roundhouse-kicked me in the face. and then i started wondering how a guardian with actual memories of their past life would cope. and then my computer/brain/keyboard exploded.</p><p>a few pointers before i set you adrift:</p><ul>
<li>guardian's name (Xio) is pronounced zee-oh. it rhymes with the word trio.</li>
<li>i'm not a physicist. please excuse me for the possible bungling of quantum entanglement theory, zero-point energy shenanigans, literally anything that has to do with paracausality and acausality</li>
<li>there are big glaring gaps in the lore about Jolyon, Laviska, how long either of them were around, when and how Laviska died, what her job was........ so i'm going to try and fill in what's missing while still leaving it undefined enough that i'll be able to edit if anything new drops</li>
<li>other ships included are (but not limited to): Osiris/Saint, Mara/Sjur, Uldren/Jolyon, Jolyon/Laviska, and basically anything that's canon or really obvious lol</li>
<li><em>PLEASE ENJOY</em></li>
</ul><p>secondly, and most importantly, this story is divided into five distinct arcs and/or parts because, for your sanity and mine, things need to be categorized, or else this would be one gigantic schlep of wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey......stuff, and that gives me anxiety, so no.</p><p>the five categories are as follows:</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p><strong>PROTOSTAR: </strong>from Yang Liwei until the Distributary.</p>
  <p><strong>HYPERBARIC</strong>: from the conclusion of the Theodicy War until the founding of the Dreaming City.</p>
  <p><strong>BLACK SUN</strong>: from the establishment of the Reef to Xio's first death.</p>
  <p><strong>DARK MATTER: </strong>from waking up in the Cosmodrome until Shadowkeep.</p>
  <p><strong>NEW LIGHT</strong>: Season of the Hunt, Beyond Light, and further.</p>
</blockquote>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. NEW LIGHT (I.I)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>On good days, she doesn’t mind Spider. She’d go so far as to say that on those good days, she even tolerates him.</p><p>Today is not one of those days.</p><p>In fact, she is now certain there’s never going to be one again—and if she manages to get through the rest of this encounter without turning the entirety of Spider’s den into a smoking, ruined heap, she will consider it a miracle; and yet another accolade in the long, long, <em> long</em>, lonely list of accolades to her gargantuan self-restraint, which she can feel fraying like a physical thing, threads coming unspooled from a greater whole. </p><p>“Traveler got your tongue?” Spider purrs.</p><p>She doesn’t dignify him with a response. He can’t see her face, at least—she keeps her helmet on most times, as a rule. That is a privacy still afforded to her, despite being a deathless husk, despite being used up and tossed aside like an empty Ether tank time and time again, despite her having no real control, no agency, no <em> freedom— </em></p><p>Tau bumps into her shoulder. The hard nudge of her Ghost’s shell shatters the seething anger, just for a precious moment.</p><p>“The High Celebrant will die,” Tau announces, the blue light of his lone eye winking.</p><p>Sweet Tau. He always knows what to say, when to say it—she lost most of her clever words and the will to speak them the day she awoke in the Cosmodrome.</p><p>After all, what’s the point of talking when no one will listen?</p><p>“Much appreciated,” Spider replies, steepling the fingers of his lower pair of arms. “As I said—the resources you need will be available to you.”</p><p>“Thanks,” Tau says warily.</p><p>“I must admit,” Spider goes on, “I expected a bit more of a… reaction. You Guardians are a cold bunch, aren’t you?”</p><p>Tau’s eye flicks back to her—and wisely, because she’s seriously contemplating unloading a wealth of incendiary rounds into Spider’s smug, sneering face. Or maybe creating a singularity behind his stupid makeshift throne, and watching the void stretch and tear him apart until his molecules collapse and implode, tiny violet motes of dying light. That sounds better. More <em> satisfying. </em></p><p>“We should be going,” her Ghost interjects. “Wrathborn to kill.”</p><p>Spider doesn’t seem to have heard him. “Do you remember when we first started doing business together, and I told you—everyone’s got a fault? A little foible, so to speak. Something that makes them stumble. A pressure point. I was really beginning to think you didn’t have one. Silly me.”</p><p>No. A singularity, and then a grenade. To detonate all of that dense mass.</p><p>“If there’s nothing else,” Tau says, floating in her direct line of sight. Like that would save Spider if she decided to turn him into a blue smear. “It’s time for us to <em> leave.” </em></p><p>Spider grins, all needle-point teeth and self-satisfaction. “Well, don’t let me stop you. You’ll be a very occupied woman for a while—more occupied than usual.”</p><p>She turns and exits the den at a brisk walk. She doesn’t know what she’ll do if she stays.</p><p>“Pleasure doing business with you!” Spider’s voice calls after her. </p><p>She keeps walking.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. NEW LIGHT (I.II)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>His Guardian isn’t generally fond of talking. </p><p>Which is why, when she tears off her helmet and paces the mid-deck of her jumpship like a caged war beast, he doesn’t say anything. She has to work through this first before he tries to reach out to her. He just watches as she stalks back and forth, pausing only to discard the helmet like it’s personally offended her. His chassis shivers at the sound of it clattering to the floor.</p><p>Threads of void energy trail after her, a visible manifestation of her turmoil. They coil around her shoulders and jaw, streaming from the corners of her silver-indigo eyes in oily, smoking tears. </p><p>The <em> real </em> tears are yet to fall, but they’re gathering nonetheless—the last time he saw her cry, it’d been years back: they’d been in her rooms in the Tower; she’d been curled up on her cot, her delicate pendant clutched between her hands, Ace of Spades holstered at her hip, weeping like a child. She still wears the necklace, under her armor, settled against her heart. He knows because he’s her Ghost, and she may fool everyone else, but never him. </p><p>He <em> does </em> startle when a howl rips out of her. </p><p>It’s a horrible sound—raw, and furious, and helpless. </p><p>If he had a heart, it would be shattering.</p><p>Shockwaves of void rattle the very deck, echoing off of steel and polymer. Everything around them groans under the onslaught. He’s seen her wrench Cabal fighters to pieces with nothing more than her mind to help her with the task, and it’s frighteningly easy to imagine the same thing happening to this ship.</p><p>But his worry doesn’t last. She slumps against a wall, a hand clasped to each temple, as though she’s trying to keep something inside her from bursting forth.</p><p>He hovers closer, touching one of her hot cheeks with a corner of his shell.</p><p>“Xio,” he murmurs. She shudders at the call of her name.</p><p>Now the tears overflow in earnest, glistening in the glow of her lilac skin, rivers of diamond under gentle light. The energy rippling just under its surface, like with all Awoken, churns faster and wilder when she is upset. Well. Describing her as <em> upset </em> is the grossest understatement of the century.</p><p>“When will it be enough?” she says, her voice hoarse and cracking. She hugs her knees to her chest, trembling. “When will this end? Are we ever meant for peace? Is servitude all we’re destined for? How much more must he suffer?”</p><p>“Xio…”</p><p>She hiccups, a frustrated noise catching in her throat. “Mara, and the Nine, the Traveler, Riven. Savathûn. The Black Garden. Light and Darkness. And now <em> Spider</em>.” </p><p>She says the final word with such venom that he’s surprised it doesn’t bore a hole straight through the hullhead.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” Tau whispers. “I don’t have any of the answers. I don’t even really know what I am, remember? Not entirely.”</p><p>“That makes two of us,” she says, bending her head. “I tried. I tried so hard to… to not hope. To try and forget. But I can’t forget. I can never forget.”</p><p>He nuzzles her forehead, the Light at his core humming. “I know. You did everything you could. You’ve been fighting so hard, for so long. Kept your secrets, though they’ve weighed you down.” He pauses, letting that sink in. “We’ll figure it out. We’ll free him and Glint from Spider, I swear.”</p><p>“I’ve lived with that… that final image of him, in my head, up until now. Laying him to rest. The shroud.” She closes her eyes tight, pressing the heels of her palms over them. “I can still hear him screaming. I can still—see his last expression.”</p><p>He knows that too, of course. </p><p>She almost never sleeps because of the nightmares. Guardians don’t absolutely have to, physically speaking, but her predicament is a lot like an Exo’s: her mind remembers the <em> need </em> for sleep, and consequently suffers when deprived of it. Being powerless to help her while she learned to strike a balance between recollection and the new, impossible limits of her Guardian physique was an experience he wishes he could scrub from his memory drives. She’d only really had to perfect the art after the… confrontation in the Dreaming City.</p><p>“I can’t promise you it’ll go better this time,” Tau says, listening to the rattling pull of her breath. “But you’re not alone. You won’t have to do this by yourself—I’ll be with you, every step of the way.”</p><p>A tremulous sob leaves her. She enfolds him in a tender grasp, fingers curving around the shape of him. She’s warm—he can feel the Light in her, shining like a beacon, so strong and bright and beautiful, though she can’t see it for herself. </p><p>“I wish I couldn’t remember,” she cries, her dark hair falling like a curtain around her face. “That I could <em> unwish </em> my wish from that day.”</p><p>Tau’s processor whirs sadly. “You don’t mean that,” he says. “What makes you different is your strength.”</p><p>Her expression crumples. “And I <em> hate </em> that I don’t mean it. If I were a better Guardian, I’d be able to let go. I wouldn’t be so tethered to the past.”</p><p>“I like you, and I think you’re a great Guardian,” Tau admits quietly. “And even if you couldn’t remember, you would still want to save him.”</p><p>“How can you be so sure?”</p><p>“Because I’m your Ghost,” he says, like it’s the most obvious thing ever. “And because that’s just who you are.”</p><p>She sniffles, holding him closer. </p><p>They stay like that for a long while.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. DARK MATTER (I.I)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She comes back to life with a handful of Old Russian dirt in her mouth.</p><p>When she spits it out, regurgitating it on the ground between her shaking hands, she finds that she still can’t breathe. The afternoon light feels like fire searing through her retinas, the vast blue sky an insult; she imagines a ghastly tableau of her optic nerves melting into one pulsating, organic mess, like those Hive masses that grow out of the corrupted crevices in the walls of… the walls of what? What’s a Hive? She knows. Doesn’t she?</p><p>“Guardian?”</p><p>Something hard and metallic is bopping her on the jaw, the nose, the forehead. </p><p>“Eyes up, Guardian!”</p><p>She groans as well as she can through the knot in her throat.</p><p>Deep down she knows it’s wrong—that <em> she’s </em> wrong. </p><p>There should be no bridge between What-Was and What-She-Will-Be, but it’s there inside her head, holding the tenuous strands of past and possibility together. And she is standing at its crux, being pulled in both directions by unstoppable forces.  </p><p>Everything hurts.</p><p>“Guardian—”</p><p>“That’s not my name,” she gasps, batting at the object, squinting at it through the glare of the sun. “That’s not my name!”</p><p>There’s a thoughtful buzz. “We can give you one, if you want.” </p><p>She coughs, curling up on her side, taking earth and pebbles with her.</p><p>“I already have a name,” she says miserably.</p><p>“No, you don’t.”</p><p>“Yes, I do,” she insists, her voice breaking. “I gave it to myself, it’s mine. I…”</p><p>The little robot—construct? Drone? Droid?—hovers in front of her face. It would fit in her palm if she chose to catch it.</p><p>“It’s okay,” it says, the wings around its central eye spinning in concern. “Nobody remembers. We can pick out one you like.”</p><p>“<em>I</em> remember,” she snarls. “It’s there, I just—all I have to—”</p><p>“Guardian, whatever you’re doing, stop. You’re bleeding!”</p><p>It’s true. Blood is flowing from her nose, over her chin and down her chest, dripping to the dusty ground beneath her.</p><p>“My name is Xio,” she says. “And I serve…”</p><p>“No! Guardian? Please, don’t push further. You’re hurting yourself!”</p><p>That much, the little drone is right about. Very right.</p><p>The world goes dark.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. DARK MATTER (I.II)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He did not know what he expected his Guardian to be.</p><p>No Ghost does, he supposes. </p><p>But she is his, even though she spent the first twenty minutes of her new life writhing in agony, being tortured by an affliction he cannot reliably heal. The fibre of her existence is unraveling at one end, being fed into a black hole of memories that she should not have, like a star slowly disintegrating into nothing under the gravitational pull of the void.</p><p>He’s never heard of anything like this ever happening with the others. He has no clue what to do.</p><p>So he stays beside her until she comes around, and when she does, he floats behind her as she drags herself under a crag of fallen debris, taking shelter from the sun and hiding. She huddles as far back in the corner created by the two gigantic slabs of upheaved asphalt as she can; and then she tries to wipe away the dried blood smudging her skin and the front of her tunic. She only succeeds in making it spread further.</p><p>He gets a good look at her as she sits there, and he realizes that despite the dishevelment and general panic, she’s very lovely. </p><p>Most Awoken are, but maybe because this one is his, he finds her special. She has long, dark hair, the color of plums, and a serious face with a strong jaw, illuminated by a pair of eyes like shards of ghostly purple Light. She has a severe appearance—but he somehow knows that she looks younger when she smiles, and that she has a mischievous streak in her that can be accessed if the right things are said, the correct lures set. </p><p>She’s wonderful, and everything he hoped his Guardian would be, no matter how puzzling her condition is—and she doesn’t trust him. He can see it in the way she shies from him, the way her gaze tracks his every move. Analytical. Cutting.</p><p>“What are you?” she says, the words hoarse and forced. </p><p>“I’m a Ghost,” he replies. “And I was looking for my Guardian. I found you.”</p><p>She wraps her arms around herself, trying to make herself small. “I didn’t ask for this.”</p><p>“No one does.”</p><p>“Why me?”</p><p>“I didn’t choose you,” he says softly. “Not consciously, anyway. I was just looking around here, searching… and when I saw you, I <em> knew. </em> It was you. It was always meant to be you.”</p><p>“How can I be a Guardian when I was—when I was…”</p><p>“Who or what you were before doesn’t matter,” Ghost tells her. “I can’t explain why the Traveler blessed you. It just… did. All I did was act as a conduit.”</p><p>Her expression becomes angry, stormy. “You Ghosts can resurrect people, and you don’t even know <em> why? </em>”</p><p>“I was meant to be your Ghost,” he says, hovering as close as he dares. “I know that much. I can feel it.”</p><p>“I don’t feel anything,” his Guardian murmurs. “Except the pain.”</p><p>“It’s not supposed to be that way.”</p><p>She looks down at her hands, flexing her fingers. “I did something. Before, when I was—not <em> this</em>. I caused whatever’s going on. I’m not right.”</p><p>“We can figure that out after I get you back to the City. Right now, we need to move. This is Fallen territory. We’re not safe, especially out in the open.”</p><p>“Fallen…? You mean the Eliksni?”</p><p>Ghost zips back and forth in front of her. “Four arms, bad attitude, obsessed with tech? Yeah. Them. The whole Cosmodrome is their stomping ground.”</p><p>“How long have I been gone?” she asks no one in particular, full of horror. </p><p>He beeps impatiently. “There’ll be time for math when we’re behind City walls! I need to find you a weapon. Or weapons. Oh, and a ship.”</p><p>“You make my head hurt,” she growls. </p><p>“If I had one, you’d make mine hurt, too,” he snaps back at her. He just wants to keep her secure, and she’s fighting him like her life depends on it. “Can you walk?”</p><p>She glares at him, and her pale lips skin back to show white teeth. “Let’s find out.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. DARK MATTER (I.III)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>we have like seven small more bits of exposition before the REAL TEA STARTS SPILLIN so just [vague hand gestures] enjoy</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She is extremely skilled with weapons and all things explosive.</p><p>Yes, Guardians are expected to be martially talented, blah, blah, the Traveler chooses those best suited to being soldiers in the war on Darkness, yadda, yadda—but she operates them with a familiarity of someone who has specific recollections attached to specific items. Which is impossible. <em> Should be </em>impossible. But there she is, handling a pulse rifle she wrested out of a Vandal’s taloned hands like she was born alongside it. </p><p>“You know, you could use your Light to fight, too,” the Ghost reminds her. </p><p>His Guardian’s beautiful face is an impassive mask, smooth and untroubled. But her right eye twitches. Infinitesimally.</p><p>“Yes, let me just do that—and perhaps blow myself up in the process,” she says primly. </p><p>“I could bring you back. If you did, that is.”</p><p>“Does this Guardian deal somehow preclude feeling pain?”</p><p>Ghost buzzes. Flares his plates. “Um… no.”</p><p>“Then I will be opting out,” she informs him, seating a new magazine into the rifle with perhaps more force than is strictly needed.</p><p>He floats up beside her ear. “You can’t avoid it. You would be a fantastic Warlock—you’re curious, and intelligent, and—”</p><p>“You don’t know me,” she hisses, lilac eyes sparking. “I survived before without a surfeit of the Light, and I can do it again.”</p><p>“But you don’t have to.”</p><p>She wheels on him. For a moment, terror electrifies his processors—because a swift, incandescent rage transforms her expression, like she’s a heartbeat away from shooting him herself.</p><p>“I have lived—I <em> had lived, </em> my entire life, by keeping the balance,” she begins, jabbing a finger at him. “Walking alone. It was the only thing that mattered to me. I picked a side by choosing none. While my people built walls, hid in garden cities and forests, and our leaders squabbled and manipulated and attempted apotheoses or named themselves prophets and apostles or grand heretics, I listened to the universe. Do you know what I heard, Ghost?”</p><p>“No?” he says, the word warbling in at barely twenty hertz. </p><p>“<em>Nothing,” </em> she says. “I heard nothing except what was there, because I was not creating answers by expecting them. I hearkened to the desires of every wretched thing tearing this world and all beyond it apart. I do not pretend to understand them, or what they crave. But I want no part of it. I have made my mistakes, I paid penance for them—I still am. Paying, forever paying. I am standing here as a Lightbearer when, as Awoken, I am—<em>was—</em>defined by the In-Between. The gap between two sides. I am <em> wrong</em>.”</p><p>This is the most she’s said since he brought her back. It’s almost too much. </p><p>She’s heaving for breath, the fragile control she’d exerted over herself splintered.</p><p>“So do not tell me to use the Light,” she finishes. “Do <em> not…” </em>Sniffs. Swipes at her cheeks. “I can’t reliably conclude that I would survive it.”</p><p>“You would,” Ghost assures her. “It’ll be innate. The Light you feel within you is part of you now. It wouldn’t harm you.”</p><p>She stares out at the jagged horizon of the collapsed Cosmodrome, their next destination, facing away from him.</p><p>“Well,” she says, “you can’t even explain to me where you came from. Excuse me if I do not take your word for it.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. DARK MATTER (I.IV)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Two taps.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Tap. Tap.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The rifle bucks in her hands, against her shoulder. The Eliksni falls, its head exploding in a fountain of steaming Ether.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That linear progression of causality is so brutally simple and uncomplicated, so easy to understand. Reload. Spot. Aim. Fire. The crack of the rifle, the thud of the bullet hitting Eliskni hide. That’s pure geometry. Action, reaction. Squeeze the trigger, watch the target go down. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“There should be a ship around here somewhere,” the little drone says. It—he—is annoyingly devoted, annoyingly attentive, and eager to shadow her every move. “Whatever’s left can’t be cream of the crop, but I can make it work.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why would I ever want to go to the City?” she asks, picking off a Dreg that peeks up from behind a gnarl of wreckage. “No one is aware I’m alive.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The drone bumps into her back. He is exceedingly casual for something she could crush underfoot. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Because there are people there that can answer your questions about being a Warlock, and your memories,” he says matter-of-factly. “Because it’s where you belong. If there’s anyone who can at least guess what’s happening to you, it’s Ikora Rey. And if, by some Light-forsaken chance, she can’t, she’ll know someone who can.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know what I did, why I can remember,” she answers, and then presses her lips into a thin line. “It’s not all there—not yet—but…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He is silent, pausing in consideration of his next question. Though she hasn’t been in his company for long, she can already tell that seldom occurs. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And what did you do?” he says quietly, after she lets the rifle fall back to a resting position.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She starts moving again, her slender feet leaving behind perfectly preserved footprints, their dusty edges already blurring with the wind. She isn’t in a hurry to confess to her greatest folly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I made a wish,” she admits eventually. “I was young, and frightened, and in my dreams, while I slept, I called out with a voice and intent I didn’t use when I was awake. I called out—and a passing dragon heard me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The little drone stiffens, his eye flitting up and down over her in panicked staccato. That is realization—she can read the signals well enough. Apparently, she will not have to elucidate further on the dangers of the Ahamkara. Not today.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ve heard every wish has a downside,” is all he says, and not immediately, either. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You are correct,” she replies.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And she leaves it at that.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. DARK MATTER (I.V)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Night has come to Old Russia.</p><p>She’s cramped up against the shell of a Golden Age vehicle, breath fogging her helmet, clutching a rifle, with Eliksni swarming all around her. It seems that wherever she goes, past life or present, they are determined to follow. And she is in this pit because her meal ticket out of this accursed, rocky wasteland is in the dilapidated hangar beyond—it’s an old jumpship, its colors faded with time, pinned up by supports whose maintainers probably died ages ago.  </p><p>“Fallen activity is off the charts,” the little drone informs her. “I’m gonna transmat out, see if I can get this thing to work. Don’t worry, I’ll still be with you.”</p><p><em> I wasn’t worried</em>, she thinks sourly to herself as the Ghost disappears in a shower of white-blue sparks. </p><p>“It’s definitely not going to break orbit,” the Ghost says from… somewhere. His voice is echoing, like he’s alone in an empty room. “But it just might get us to the City.”</p><p>“Joy,” she mumbles, reloading with mechanical precision. </p><p>That’s when it happens: a shimmer of cloaking tech, undulating in the rightmost corner of her peripheral vision, and then an impact to her abdomen that knocks the air from her lungs—and the rifle from her hands. She lands in what used to be the passenger seat, back-down, her weight rattling the metal skeleton of the car. </p><p>There’s a Marauder leaned over her, howling in her face, its many eyes blazing with Ether. </p><p>Flakes of rust are falling all around them, like a rain of fine brown petals. The Marauder is still screaming. Droplets of saliva splatter on her helmet and gauntlets, flung from its outstretched mandibles. The Ghost is shouting something, but she has no idea what it is.</p><p>She only knows that she will not die again. Not here. Not so soon.</p><p>The Marauder uses its distal pair of arms to try and strangle her. Claws dig into her throat, scraping at the rapid pulse thudding through her carotid. One of the limbs from the primary pair lifts, revealing a wrist-mounted blade, sharper than sharp, reflecting the dull orange of the bulbs scattered throughout the hangar.</p><p>The sight of it is practically a galvanic shock. Her heart leaps in its cage of bone, squirming like a wild thing. Every atom in her soul hums with sudden, vicious song. </p><p>Her airway closes as the Marauder’s grip tightens. But she is not frightened. She is <em> enraged. </em></p><p>She shoves, beating back on the ragged chestplate—and the Marauder comes apart under her touch, ringed in dark light.</p><p>It shrieks and tries to twist away, but the violet affliction is already eating away at its skin, the muscle and tendon beneath it, disintegrating its weapons and the very matter of its being. She lets the song flow faster, tearing through the veil separating the endless potential of the vacuum from the static, motionless world. </p><p>The harmony of it is so overwhelming and beautiful—she doesn’t know how she could have possibly thought it would kill her, because <em> kill </em> is such a final, mortal word, and it implies violence, not symmetry; the void is more than that. It is the mother of all melody, the dark space between the stars, the sea of silent symphonies that connects everything. She feels a twinge of envy: the Marauder is going back to that place, where rest is uninterrupted and peace is absolute, to be one with the most fundamental strata of existence. Xio will remain.</p><p>She does not move when the last globule of her opponent has dissolved, paralyzed not by what she’s done— but by how she did it. Instead she stares at her hands, which are still thrumming with that unknowable energy. She can feel it in her bones, in her marrow, that throbbing, subsonic rhythm that’s promising her she could bend gravity to her will, send far-reaching ripples through the fabric of space-time. This is undoubtedly better than the malformed telekinesis she displayed as a girl.</p><p>“Guardian! <em> Hello, </em>Guardian?! Oh—it doesn’t matter. Bringing you in!”</p><p>Her surroundings vanish, replaced by the filthy cockpit of the jumpship. The Ghost is hovering by the dashboard, plates clicking and separating in a frantic cadence.</p><p>“Are you hurt?” he asks, buzzing near. “Did it get you? Hang on, I’m gonna get us out of here.”</p><p>The jumpship shambles to life around them. For a second, the juddering is so bad, it seems like it’ll go to pieces beneath them. </p><p>Thankfully, what she comes next is the compression of lifting off, not a fatal explosion—and then she’s pushed back by the acceleration of the ship speeding from the hangar, blazing a path clear through the Eliksni attempting to obstruct it. </p><p>“I managed to grab your gun, too,” the Ghost is saying, not deterred by her lack of response, or that she’s laid prone on the floor like a discarded ragdoll. “I saw what you did to that Fallen. That’s the power of the Light. And like I said, it was natural, wasn’t it? Instinctive? Didn’t it feel <em> right</em>?”</p><p>It did. That’s what scares her the most.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. DARK MATTER (I.VI)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>His Guardian sleeps through most of the twenty hour flight to the Last City.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She hadn’t replied to any of his questions—just pulled off her helmet and gauntlets, crawled into the worn pilot’s seat, curled into a ball, and passed out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Outside, vast expanses of wilderness pass them by; first, bathed in the golden radiance of the dawn, then in the sweltering heat of noon. There’s a substantial time difference between the lands of Old Russia and the Last City—but his Guardian takes no notice, deep in slumber as she is.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>No one chases them, which is unexpected, but good. And so the jumpship rattles on, past the coastline and over the South Atlantic Ocean, some thirty-eight thousand miles in the air. Clouds skim by, and then give way to a clear day, transparent as crystal. The water below is as peaceful as it gets, shining like an endless supply of liquid Glimmer. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She turns about once or twice, unconsciously readjusting herself to be more comfortable. When she settles again, he sees that the ridged pattern of the seat has left impressions on her cheek and the back of her hand.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Eventually, the day turns to night, they put the ocean behind them, and the landscape turns mountainous: snow-capped peaks and volcanoes rise on the horizon, a line of jagged teeth. The ship soars above glacier lakes and tangles of viridian rainforest, untouched since the Collapse. Earth is still a captivating garden world, despite its war-torn history, despite the industrialization that very nearly destroyed it entirely.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But he has a hard time looking anywhere but up. The Traveler has been looming in the distance like a pearled sun for hours now; it is the jewel in the crown of this myriad of amazing sights. The shimmer of its domed shielding is clearly visible in contrast to the night sky—the relief he feels upon seeing it is indescribable. He doesn’t mind being away from the Traveler, and he’s journeyed further than Earth to find his Guardian, but coming back is always the best part. He’s missed his home.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wonders if he should poke her. They’re almost there.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Guardian,” he whispers, drifting to her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She winces, though her eyes are shut—she’s not fully conscious, not by a long shot.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Guardian,” he tries again, just as softly, “we’ll be at the Tower in approximately forty-five minutes.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She shows no indication of having heard him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He decides not to push his luck, and withdraws to run another round of diagnostics. He’s been checking on the jumpship with a paranoid diligence that’s half fueled by the state of the ship itself, and half by the simple truth that he really has nothing else to do. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Besides, it would be a terrible sort of irony if they’d made it this far only to crash within sniffing distance of the Last City.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That’s what he tells himself, anyway.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’s plates-deep in a scan of the mechanisms around the missing warp drive when his Guardian lurches awake, a shout dying in her throat. The seat creaks in protest under the abrupt redistribution of her weight. His processes stutter to a halt, distracted as he is by the sheer terror in her expression. Sweat gleams at her brow.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Bad dream?” he says.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>On a scale of one to Lord Shaxx, that is probably the most tactless greeting he’s blurted yet. To his eternal gratitude, she doesn’t seem to have noticed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She just presses her palm to a spot on her chest, between her clavicles—a nervous gesture he’s seen her do often since he resurrected her—and bows her head.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We’ve arrived,” she says. It’s not an inquiry.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes. We’re going to make landfall soon. Welcome home, Guardian.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He tries to convince himself it doesn’t hurt him when she turns away.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. DARK MATTER (I.VII)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The City is at rest when they disembark.</p><p>Nonetheless, she feels out of place the moment her boots make contact with the Tower floor. </p><p>Every tear and blemish she’s accrued over the last day and a half suddenly seem like neon targets splashed across each available surface of her body: they mark her as different, other, newcomer, and she despises it. She misses her uniform, her <em> real </em>ship, her lovingly curated cache of weapons—she misses her throwing knives, the long night patrols, her friends, the solitary haunts she called her own. She misses the swaying fields of flowers, and the secret grotto she found under the waterfall deep in Rheasilvia. She used to linger there in chambers of starlight when her mind grew too cluttered, and her worries too many. </p><p>Will she ever see it again?</p><p>“Ikora makes it her business to meet every new Warlock,” the Ghost says. “You should at least introduce yourself to her and the Speaker before turning in for the night. Come to think of it, Ikora might be on her way already.”</p><p>The thought of conversation makes Xio want to hurl herself from the ledge she’s standing on.</p><p>“Please don’t do anything rash,” the little drone pleads, wheeling in the air. “I know this is all very strange and new and you don’t want to be here, but just give us a chance. You can look around more tomorrow—or don’t, or do whatever you want, and grab the next shuttle out. Just… don’t leave me behind. Don’t leave me alone. I’m tired of being alone.”</p><p>Troublingly, that short speech rouses her sympathy. She imagines this small, chatty Ghost looking for her across a span of centuries, searching for a Guardian that didn’t even exist yet, and her heart tightens. She knows something of being lonely. Too much, perhaps.</p><p>“At the moment, I am not going anywhere,” she says. “I need… to rest. Regroup. Gain my bearings.”</p><p>The light of his eye flickers in relief. “Oh. That’s—that’s good,” he states, static warbling through the frequency of his audio projectors. “Do you like ramen? There’s an amazing ramen stand on the lower levels. Um. I’ve been <em> told </em> it’s amazing, I obviously can’t tell, personally…”</p><p>The non-sequitur leaves her brain rattling.</p><p>“Noodles?” she says blankly.</p><p>“Sorry, am I blabbing? I’m definitely blabbing, aren’t I? It’s been a long day, and I had started losing hope that’d I’d ever find you—and now you’re here, and, uh—”</p><p>“Stop,” she interrupts, and the Ghost freezes as though she’s blasted him with ice. “It’s fine. We’ve been through a lot. And I… I’m still scared of what’s become of me. I don’t wish to seem ungrateful. But I’ve spent—I <em> spent </em>—my entire life mistrusting anything other than my own skill. I don’t know how to have faith in the Light, or the Traveler.”</p><p>“It could be worse,” he says. “You don’t need to have faith to do what’s right.” He buzzes thoughtfully. “I won’t tell you not to be scared. How could you not be? Especially given your—erm, condition. We’re together, though. I’m going to help you however I can.”</p><p>When was the last time someone promised her such aid, no strings attached, and <em> after </em>listening to a chip of her doubts? She doesn’t want to think about it enough to discover the answer.</p><p>“So,” she begins awkwardly, “where do I find this Ikora Rey?”</p><p>Ghosts can’t smile—but she’s certain that if he could, he would be.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. DARK MATTER (I.VIII)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>cayde makes his appearance before the official LI in this story because that's what cayde deserves</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She does end up meeting Ikora Rey and the heads of the Vanguard, in that order.</p><p>Ikora is similar to the Queen’s Techeuns, but she’s warmer and kinder than them—the Techeuns always seem far away, however personable they may be in fleeting moments of camaraderie and cooperation; they only have room for the Queen in their minds and hearts, like so many of Xio’s people. Ikora, instead, calls her by name immediately, picking up on her distaste for her latest title with the ease of someone who has been observing others for centuries. </p><p>Xio stands about a head and a half shorter than Ikora, but she feels no sense of inferiority or trepidation: Ikora is too honest for that sort of first impression to take root, and cuts a tall, proud figure in her excellently-maintained robes. The fiberweave of her armor glistens with purple chrome, shifting whenever she moves.</p><p>“You finally found her,” Ikora says, casting a slight smile at the Ghost, who is humming with such excitement that he seems fit to combust. “I’m happy for you.”</p><p>“Thanks,” the drone replies earnestly, his light flaring with what Xio supposes is the Ghost equivalent of pride. “I knew I couldn’t just give up!”</p><p>“Hey, hey—you planning on ignoring us?” says the blue Exo across the war table. He waves at Xio when she catches his eye, waggling his fingers.</p><p>“She <em> just </em> walked in,” Ikora says dryly. “Give her a moment to breathe.”</p><p>“Meh, breathing’s overrated.”</p><p>Ikora sighs. “Xio, this is Cayde-6, Hunter Vanguard.”</p><p>The Exo—Cayde—just gives her another wave. “Welcome to the fold, Warlock,” he greets. “If you ever need something <em> actually exciting </em> to do, come see me.”</p><p>“And this is Commander Zavala,” Ikora goes on, like Cayde didn’t even speak. “He leads the Titans of the City.”</p><p>Zavala is a broad Awoken man—the first of her kind she has seen since landfall—clad in imposing, bulky armor. And then she looks at him, and the sight of his face has her stomach plummeting to her toes. She recognizes him. His name-from-then escapes her, like most of the finer, filmy details of her past, but she knows what she feels to be true. </p><p>There was no massive colony of Awoken at the time of the schism, when those who decided Mara’s way was not the path they wanted to walk; she remembers almost everyone from that original operating crew on the Liwei, the precious remnants of life unraveled and respun at the heart of a raging kugelblitz. He’d been… a scout? He’d left the Reef with his likeminded brothers and sisters, courage on solar wings, and earned Mara’s ire forevermore. </p><p>The Queen likes her plans, and if she is to be believed, the Awoken are the greatest of them all, nurtured and deceived and guided and manipulated over the trajectory of a thousand-thousand lifetimes. She had not taken the exiles’ decision to break from the Reef lightly.</p><p>The man who is now Zavala, however, just appraises her with a calculating eye. There is no trace of memory in him. Out of the two of them, she definitely drew the shorter straw. Cold sweat is gathering at her nape, in the crooks of her elbows. Her heart hammers. This is why the Traveler brings Guardians back as blank as canvas. To be spared this turmoil.</p><p>Ages’ worth of training and conditioning are how she keeps her composure. She withholds a wince when Zavala speaks. </p><p>“Guardian,” he says, nodding at her in acknowledgement. “Good to have you with us.”</p><p>“See, this is why—other than being large—he’s the guy in charge,” Cayde tells Xio seemingly in aside, though everyone at the table can hear him fine. “Got a way with words. Inspirational.”</p><p>Zavala’s brow creases in irritation. </p><p>“Do you like to read, Xio?” Ikora cuts in. “I have some primers on Warlock techniques and their applications that you may find interesting.”</p><p>She blinks. Wets her lips. </p><p>“I… I do. I would appreciate that,” she says. “My thanks.”</p><p>Ikora smiles that little smile again. “Think nothing of it. I’ll have them sent to your Ghost.”</p><p>Cayde looks positively wounded. “You’re gonna spend your first night here <em> reading? </em>Why not drink? Or, like, maybe take the world’s longest bubble-bath? Probably need it.”</p><p>Both Ikora and Zavala level hard looks at him this time; he raises his arms in the universal gesture for surrender and contrition, though Xio has the suspicion this man rarely engages in or displays either. He… reminds her of someone.</p><p>“I can read in the tub,” she says without hesitation.</p><p>Cayde lets out a surprised laugh. “Warlock idea of a party, huh? Well, I’m not one to judge.”</p><p>This time, it’s Zavala’s turn to sigh.</p><p>“Come,” Ikora says, gesturing to the doorway. “Let me show you the available apartments. You can settle in at your leisure.”</p><p>Xio lets Ikora lead her away.</p><p>“Don’t be a stranger!” Cayde calls after them.</p><p>“Yes, he’s always like that,” Ghost says to her as they enter the hallway. “And no, you shouldn’t play cards with him.”</p><p>“Games of chance are not to my liking,” Xio says. “Far too much of a margin for error.”</p><p>Ahead of her, Ikora chuckles. “You’re going to fit in around here just fine.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. DARK MATTER (I.IX)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>be a guardian! claim your lifelong clinical depression today!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Ikora tells her she can go to see the Speaker in the morning.</p><p>They exchange goodnights at the doorway of Xio’s unit, which is on a terraced level near a complex Ikora calls Tower North. An observatory juts out of the side of the biggest building, backlit by the soft orange glow of hanging lanterns. The Speaker resides there, apparently, so it won’t be a long walk tomorrow—just a journey up a winding sequence of stairs to a courtyard, and then across the courtyard, up more stairs, to the observatory proper.</p><p>But that will be dealt with tomorrow.</p><p>Ikora shuts the door behind her, leaving Xio to look around her temporary home.</p><p>The apartment itself is, in actuality, a big room: it is spartan, furnished with necessities—a bed against the free wall of the kitchen, a table with a pair of chairs in its center, and a small adjoining bathroom. There’s even a tiny balcony behind a set of sliding glass doors, with a panoramic view of the Traveler bearing down over the City. </p><p>She keeps her back to the windows as she shuffles into the bathroom. The little drone follows her uncertainly.</p><p>Slowly, she divests herself of every piece of armor she woke up in, until she’s left only in thin underclothes and the precious pendant around her neck. The armor itself is completely unfamiliar—she certainly never owned anything like it in life. But she has more pressing and troubling questions regarding subjects other than her wardrobe. </p><p>The woman staring back at her from the slender mirror mounted above the sink seems like a stranger. She doesn’t look any physically different, not according to her memory, but she’s somehow totally changed. Is it in the eyes? Is it because her perspective and the very foundation of her existence have been taking a mighty beating since the second she took in a lungful of Old Russian air? She can’t tell.</p><p>She runs a wondering hand over her cheek, marveling at the heat and solidity there. There are no scars. Not new ones, anyhow. </p><p>The last thing she can remember with any clarity is being crushed under the wreckage of her ship, shields guttering around her. <em> Her </em> ship, not the wreck they’d flown to the City. There’d been fire. And smoke. She could barely breathe as she sent her final transmission.</p><p>“I died in the aftermath of our Reef Wars,” she says, startling the Ghost. “Long after we stopped the Wolves from joining with the rest of the Houses converging on your City.”</p><p>Ghost’s light flickers, his plates separating. “The Twilight Gap?” he remarks, more to himself than anyone else. “That… was over fifty years ago.”</p><p>Having a concrete number to attach to her absence doesn’t make her feel any better. In truth, it gives the wound inside her a defined shape. It is a wicked thing, cruelly edged, open and bleeding. </p><p><em> Fifty years</em>.</p><p>She clutches the rim of the sink so she doesn’t do something stupid, like punching the mirror.</p><p>“Guardian?”</p><p>“<em>Don’t </em> call me that,” she snaps, regretting it swiftly when the Ghost reels back in shock. She shrinks in on herself. “Please. Just—just use my name. <em> Please.” </em></p><p>“Alright,” he says softly. He bumps into her shoulder. “Xio. What can I do to help, Xio?”</p><p>She can feel the panic cresting in her like a tidal wave.</p><p>“I don’t know,” she admits, and just saying that makes every awful truth about her circumstances <em> realer. </em>She’s stranded, so far from anything that she has ever loved. “I—I don’t know. I can’t go back, can I? I can never go back.”</p><p>“The Reef is… forbidden to outsiders,” the Ghost informs her cautiously. “There’s an embargo. It’s been in place since—well, forever. They’re <em> really </em> not fond of Guardians.”</p><p>Xio thinks about the impassive clinicality on the Queen’s face as she regarded Savin. The way everyone gathered there referred to him as <em> it</em>, the way he’d been killed twice before ever being brought to Mara. She feels the cold grasp of fear. That’s her now—the it, the exile, the deathless husk. It’s through no choice of her own, but that would hold no gravity whatsoever. Mara’s will is absolute, her rulings, non-negotiable.</p><p>
  <em> Make the exception for one, you must make it for all. </em>
</p><p>Isn’t that what the Queen had told her, that day in the infirmary?</p><p>“No,” Xio says faintly. “They aren’t.” </p><p>“You’re Reefborn, then?”</p><p>“Is that what they call us? I was not born on Vesta, or anywhere in the Reef. I was… it’s a long story.”</p><p>The Ghost settles on her. He is warm, like a living thing. She sees him eyeing the pendant, though he doesn’t ask about it. Wise choice. “You can tell me what you want, when you want. It’s okay. I’m as much in the dark as you are. Guardians aren’t supposed to remember.”</p><p>“Because it hurts,” she explains. “Because it detracts from their purpose. I’ve met Guardians. Every one of them was driven. Fervent. Wholly sure of their place in the universe. I am empty. I don’t desire more fighting, I just want to go home.”</p><p>“I’m sorry. If I had known…”</p><p>“It’s not your fault,” she says, and surprises herself with how much she means it. “Wishes are fickle. They have teeth. I’ve been feeling their bite long before you brought me back.”</p><p>Ghost regards their reflections in the mirror. “So… what now?”</p><p>She can do nothing about her present situation, about the Vanguard, and her death, and the distant Queen in a Reef far away. Xio turns her mind to more tangible pursuits. She twists the length of her hair around a fist, holding firm.</p><p>“Are there any scissors in this apartment?” </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0013"><h2>13. DARK MATTER (I.X)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>exposition is now officially over. you know what that means ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>As planned, the following morning, his Guardian visits the Speaker.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Mercifully, it is a totally unremarkable meeting, short in duration and vague in content. The Speaker makes certain to emphasize her place in the Tower, among the ranks of Guardians at large, and Ghost can’t help but think that it’s going to do nothing but push her further away from a cause she already doubts.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s polite to the Speaker, if distant, and after it’s over, she promptly retreats to her apartment.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Regardless, Ghost feels like they’ve reached—and surpassed—a hurdle in their relationship.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Xio doesn’t avoid him anymore when he drifts near, though she doesn’t reach out to him, either. Maybe it’s the neural symbiosis all Guardians and their Ghosts share at play—though he’s met enough of both to have learned that the symbiosis doesn’t help squat if someone’s determined to be malicious or skeptical. There’s no guarantee that a friendship will develop when a Ghost resurrects its Guardian.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But he’s patient, and he </span>
  <em>
    <span>knows</span>
  </em>
  <span> she’s not a bad person. She’s just scared, and upset, and… deeply traumatized. A stranger in a strange land. He can wait. He’ll be whatever she requires until she’s back on her feet.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They haven’t talked since they got to the apartment. She’d gone to her bed, turned away from the windows, again, drawn up the covers, and sat down to think. At least, that’s what it looks like she’s doing. She’s been staring at the same spot on the off-white wall for the last half hour. He can’t detect anything special about that spot in particular—so she </span>
  <em>
    <span>is</span>
  </em>
  <span> actually just thinking, or dissociating heavily. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ghost is seated on her knee, looking up at her. A shower and a night’s rest did wonders for her complexion. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She cut at least two feet of her own hair off last night, and spent a good hour evening out the rest of the ends; now it frames her face sleekly, level with her chin, and her fringe is clipped back from her eyes. Funny how a single cosmetic change can make her appear like a different person.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You were looking at this yesterday,” she says, jolting him from his thoughts.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Huh?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s pulled the pendant from her undershirt, letting it dangle in front of him. It’s very simple—an ornament no bigger than a Golden Age American quarter, hanging from a fine, silvery chain. The little disc is made of some sort of transparent material, and inside it is suspended a cross-section of glittering, nebulous matter. It’s purple—dark in parts, gauzy in others, and speckled with points of light like so many gleaming stars.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ghost zooms his lens in on it, but none of his scans bring up a matching hit for the stuff inside the pendant.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s beautiful,” he says reverently. “What is it?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She strokes a thumb over the pendant. Her expression is soft and loving. “It’s a part of a bough from a Baryon tree. They grow in the Dreaming City.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It… seems like some kind of diffusuceae,” Ghost murmurs. His processors work for a flash, committing it to memory. Storing it for the future.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good eye,” Xio says. “They can be used for many things—medicine, incense for meditation, fuel. But they’re lovely to behold, too.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I can imagine.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The glow of her eyes dims. “This is the only thing left from before,” she remarks. “Don’t know where everything else went. I’m assuming my ship was picked clean and salvaged, that the rest was taken or peeled off of me, but this remained.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s special to you,” Ghost murmurs. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes,” she says. Her fist clenches around the pendant, hiding it from view. “It was. It is.” Her voice lowers to a whisper. “It was a gift.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ghost whirs sadly, clinging to her knee.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It was supposed to remind me that I had something to return to,” Xio mutters. Her lips press into a thin line—that’s all he’ll be getting from her today.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’ll return,” he assures. “One way or another. I’m no Traveler, but I’ve been around for a while—and I’ve seen that there’s a certain symmetry to how events unfold.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She tucks her necklace back under her shirt. “I hope you’re right.”</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0014"><h2>14. PROTOSTAR (I.I)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>hhhHHHYYHYAAAAAAAAA (also, heavy spoilers for marasenna, the maraid, and the forsaken prince start here)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>One day, the Hunter finds a retreat in the wilds.</p><p>On the border between a forest and a stretch of grassland, there stands a thatched hut surrounded by rich mahogany soil, from which a flourishing garden of everything grows. </p><p>Like the rest of the Distributary, it is a silent ode to the beauty of carbon-based life, a song without voice. There are harmonies of wildflowers, mordant trills of little blossoming herbs turning their faces to the sun; the neat, accompanying orchard is a symphony of color and glistening leaves, heavy with the promise of the percussion of fruit.</p><p>About half a day due east of this place is a village—from where the Hunter began his journey, eager to map the endless, bountiful regions of the Distributary laid out before him like a magnificent diorama. He’d stayed in the village for a spell, watching the people living there, learning how they talked and interacted, but a single word stood out to him over the course of his observation, repeated constantly: ‘Anchoress.’ </p><p>An epithet attached to a figure, attached to a mystery; Uldren hungers for mysteries, not much in the way Mara loves her secrets, because Mara cultivates mystique with the careful hand of a strategist—she lets ideas burgeon and propagate, where he prefers to collect and explore. He is here to discover, not obfuscate. </p><p>The Anchoress had piqued his interest, and that interest had not been answered by the villagers: <em> speak to her, </em> they’d said. <em> For her story is not ours to tell. </em></p><p>“Where does one go, should they seek the Anchoress?” he had asked.</p><p>“Follow the symbol trees,” they had replied.</p><p>So he’d set out to do just that, with his crow-eagle on his shoulder, and a blade at his hip.</p><p>X marks the spot; so it was in their old life, so it is in the new. </p><p>Every couple of hundred feet, there’d been a tree with an X etched into the bark of its trunk, signs of a pilgrimage inscribed onto reality. This is a path that’s been walked often—by the villagers, by people who come here just for whatever it is the Anchoress can give them—and like any scout worth his salt, Uldren had been eager to see its culmination.</p><p>The hut is nothing impressive, not upon first sight, but Uldren knows better than anyone that appearances are largely deceiving. Mara has been teaching him that lesson since the day Osana brought them into the world.</p><p>He wanders the trail bisecting the garden, letting the tall swaying fronds of plants he can’t name brush at his knees and hands. There are blue flowers whose heads are shaped like starbursts, their petals circling a silver center; there are bunches of venom-vivid, fuchsia berries, whispering ferns, and reaching vines studded with velvety, burgundy blooms.</p><p>It’s serene. He likes it.</p><p>He finds what he’s searching for at the back of the orchard.</p><p>There’s a woman there, barefoot, her back turned to him; she is standing on a stepladder, picking fruits and lowering them into a wicker basket strapped to her waist. She is clad in roughspun robes, and her hair is bound in a lengthy braid, hanging low between her shoulders.</p><p>He comes to a halt.</p><p>Without facing him, she says, “Why, a bird’s flown in. Or were you blown in by the wind, Hunter?”</p><p>“Are you the Anchoress?”</p><p>She glances at him over her shoulder—her eyes are silver-bright, flushed with iris purple.</p><p>“No,” she says shortly. “I am Xio.”</p><p>Uldren crosses his arms. “Allow me to rephrase: are you the one the villagers call the Anchoress?”</p><p>Now she faces him, and he feels a prickle of familiarity as he looks her over. She descends her stepladder, making no noise except for the rustle of her robes.</p><p>“<em>That </em> is the correct question,” she praises. She gestures to her basket. “Would you care for a qalarine? They taste like a cross between Concord grapes and green apples.”</p><p>He is surprised she remembers Earth—or its fruits—at all.</p><p>“No, thank you,” he says, a little thrown by how unceremonious she’s being.</p><p>“Shame,” she remarks. She moves around him, making for the hut. “They’re really quite lovely. And yes, as you were wondering: some have decided to address me as the Anchoress.”</p><p>‘Some?’ Every villager he’d spoken to practically treated her like a mythical woodland creature. Is that disingenuous humility, or genuine ignorance on her part?</p><p>Unwilling to be left behind, he follows in her footsteps, his stride easily catching up to hers.</p><p>“We’ve met before,” he states, looking at her face for any hint of a reaction. There is none.</p><p>“We have,” she confirms. “I’m touched you could tell, since half the time we spent together involved you bleeding, or my stuffing cytogel down your throat.”</p><p>Recognition hits him hard. “The doctor,” he says faintly. </p><p>“Psychobiologist,” she corrects, sending a fizz of déjà vu through him. “Not that the distinction matters anymore. But yes, I was in Medical often.”</p><p>He keeps pace with her, glimpsing at her out of the corner of his eye. The noonday sun is complimentary on her.</p><p>“Why do you live here alone?” Uldren asks.</p><p>“Why did you come here to see me?” she returns.</p><p>“Because I wanted to.”</p><p>She nods. “Precisely. Besides—I am not alone. Hawks nest in the remains of a shuttle near my home. There are birds in the forest, and animals of all sorts on the plains. From time to time, I even have visitors.”</p><p>An odd perspective, but he’s heard odder. </p><p>“The villagers hold you in very high regard,” he says carefully. </p><p>“Through no effort of my own, I assure you,” she remarks, with a tone of regret. “Very few remember the Yang Liwei—fewer still understand how it was we came to be. They think I have answers.”</p><p>“And do you?”</p><p>She stops to turn to him, gazing at him steadily. “Is that why you’re here, Uldren?” she says. “Answers?”</p><p>She knows his true, remade name. She knew who he was the moment he appeared before her—like in most of their previous interactions, now separated from the present by the warping vortex of time and space, he is at a keen disadvantage. Not because she is forcing him into a corner, or because she’s somehow outpacing him, but because her tendency toward plain honesty is disarming, and he is too accustomed to encryption of both language and feeling.</p><p>He tries to find that same honesty in himself, trawling through an endless combination of words, an infinitude of possibilities. He settles on one.</p><p>“The thread of a story led me here,” he says. “I only wanted to hear it.”</p><p>Xio smiles at him—a real smile, unfolding like dawn. Fascinating. </p><p>“I can tell stories,” she says, tilting her head at him. “And clear up certain misconceptions.”</p><p>He grins back. “If I ask the right questions.”</p><p>“Just so. Is your handsome raptor hungry? I have some dried, unspiced meats I keep just for the birds.”</p><p>He blinks at her, and then looks past her, to where his crow-eagle is perched on the reed fence of the hut. He hadn’t noticed. He is—normally more observant than that.</p><p>“He would not say no to a meal,” Uldren replies.</p><p>“Let us go,” Xio beckons, hefting up her basket. “We can eat in the garden.”</p><p>He supposes he’s staying, then. For a while.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0015"><h2>15. PROTOSTAR (I.II)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>i have officially reached the end of my backlog, my loves!!!! i have like three pages of ideas that i still need to write, but if you want to see a take on a specific scene, just tell me and i'll see if i can work it in ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡ – ✧)</p><p>longest chap yet bc they wouldn't stop talking lol</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Uldren wonders what it is about intelligent people that is drawn to solitude.</p><p>Osana has her house with its spacious porch in the green rolling hills outside of the city; he’s spent more than a few mornings watching the sunrise with her, after tabling their heavier discussions for another time. Then there’s Mara in her eyrie, surveying a kingdom of dead and broken birds from atop her lookout, straddling the line where the static existence of the Awoken meets the changing tempest of the Distributary. Lastly, but not least, loyal Jolyon. Jolyon has, perhaps, two friends—one of them is Uldren—and no abode to return to except that of the uncharted path. Uldren is sometimes convinced his best friend does more exploring than him.</p><p>And here is Xio, hidden from plain sight, living as she did on the Yang Liwei: self-sustaining, self-contained, and self-disciplined. </p><p>There’s something upsetting about it, though he cannot pinpoint what. She had no family with her on the ship—no lover or spouse, no immediate friends he can remember seeing her talking with. She’d gotten along well enough with Mother, and he knows she’d once enjoyed the confidence of Alis Li, when the Queen was still Captain, and none of them had yet been unmade.</p><p>The thought of such an existence, isolated, saddens him. He enjoys a certainty nobody else does—come what may, he will always have Mara.</p><p>If Xio can see the somber strain of his thoughts, she makes no mention of it. </p><p>She serves him his meal in a smooth earthen bowl—it consists of a wide strip of roasted meat and onion-like vegetables wrapped in a sheet of soft flatbread. Between two smaller, similar bowls, she’s divided the salad she prepared while the meat cooked: a pounded medley of green beans and sour berries, drenched in an oily, salty-sweet sauce. It’s like nothing he’s had while visiting Mara, but he takes to it quickly.</p><p>She’d drawn up a pair of lumpy cushions and laid them on the reed mat she had rolled out in the patch of garden closest to the hut; in the shade of the trees, flanked by flora, it’s a comfortable place to sit and eat. It’s the most peace he’s felt in weeks.</p><p>Uldren’s crow-eagle abandoned the fence for a closer view of the goods about ten minutes ago. He is currently watching Xio with rapt interest as she takes mighty bites of her wrap.</p><p>“You are very fetching. Yes, you are,” she coos. “Such big eyes! Such regal bearing!”</p><p>He tries to hide his smile behind a mouthful of salad. That only lasts so long.</p><p>“Keep praising him, and it will go to his head,” Uldren cautions.</p><p>“He deserves it,” Xio says. She reaches for a piece of the dried meat she’d set aside on some oiled paper for the crow-eagle, and tosses it in his direction. <em> Snap. </em>A wicked beak clicks shut around the morsel. “What a tremendous catch!”</p><p>“At this rate, he’s going to become impossible.”</p><p>She gives him a sly look. “Ah, well, that sounds like a problem <em> you </em>will have to deal with.”</p><p>He laughs. “I see how it is.”</p><p>“Is the food to your taste?”</p><p>“Yes,” he answers, scraping up some more salad with his spoon.</p><p>“I’m glad. I haven’t entertained a guest in… a while.”</p><p>“So the faithful adherents that make the journey here aren’t treated to luncheon?” </p><p>“I see your glibness remains unchanged,” Xio says primly, jabbing at him with her half-eaten wrap. “It’s monstrously awkward—they come bearing gifts, requesting my advice, my counsel. Asking someone a question does not incur in them a duty to answer.”</p><p>“But?” he follows up.</p><p>“But if I can help, and it does not harm me to help, I will not refuse,” she finishes in a soft voice. “Though it seems I cannot escape being in the service of others, however far I go.”</p><p>He knows the sound of an old wound when he hears it. </p><p>“You chose well,” Uldren says. “The location, I mean. It’s calm. Restful. If not very defensible.”</p><p>She chuckles. “I’m glad it passes muster. Mostly.”</p><p>Quiet settles over them for a moment, punctuated only by the scrape of utensils on ceramic, the crow-eagle’s chirping.</p><p>“What is his name?” Xio says. She is stroking the backs of her fingers down the raptor’s silky black keel. Surprisingly, she doesn’t lose any of her appendages in the process. </p><p>Uldren lowers his bowl.</p><p>“He doesn’t have one,” the Hunter replies.</p><p>Surprise flitters across Xio’s face, brief and delicate. “No? May I inquire as to why?”</p><p>He does not meet her eyes. “It would mean nothing.”</p><p>Her inquisitive stare is more or less a physical force.</p><p>“Nothing?” she repeats. “How could it mean nothing when you love him so?”</p><p>There it is—that honesty. Cutting and caring, simultaneously. Like the nip of a blade, soothed immediately by velvet. </p><p>“There would be no point,” he maintains.</p><p>She looks from the crow-eagle, preening at her knuckles, and then to him. Back to the crow-eagle. He sees the exact instant she passes from puzzlement to understanding, and then from understanding to sorrow. It shames him, almost, that she comprehends the mechanism behind his reasons so easily. Mother has told him before that he wears his heart on his sleeve. He has apparently not gotten any better at concealing it. </p><p>“Uldren,” Xio says, “his life will never mean nothing just because death awaits him at the end of it.”</p><p>Death. A final word. </p><p>Uldren has died before—in the nucleus of the mingling between Light and Dark, every soul on the Yang Liwei was torn apart and put together. But, maybe it <em> wasn’t </em> death, because it was temporary, like a deep sleep in a silent place, until Mara and Alis Li passed over them all, waking them with an intangible brush of consciousness and intent. Until Mara made them what they are.</p><p>Such a thing will never happen for his crow-eagle. For any of them, first or last. </p><p>He wants to deflect with a clever quip, or a curiosity within a curiosity, a multi-layered subject change that will lead the conversation anywhere else. </p><p>What he blurts instead is: “It is a heinous waste.”</p><p>Far more revealing than he intended. His lips thin into a single line, as though he could perhaps weld his mouth shut through force of will. </p><p>“It hurts,” she agrees. “It hurts to lose someone you love. Of course it does. Every bird I’ve raised has, at some point, flown south—to the Feather Barrens. When it is their time, they go.”</p><p>“We do not die,” he says.</p><p>“We,” Xio says as she strokes her hand down the crow-eagle’s back, “are an aberration.”</p><p>Finally, it is the shock he feels at that statement that causes him to look at her. Her icy eyes are serious. Fierce. For an eternal second, he fears, irrationally, her perceiving the truth of truths. But she can’t know—he and Mara are the only ones aware of the terrible secret that began the Awoken. </p><p>“Why would you say that?” Uldren murmurs. </p><p>“It is what I believe to be true,” she replies. “The circumstances and variables involved in our creation have a chance of less than one in a trillion of occurring once more in the exact same way, in the exact same sequence. The Distributary is a paradise, but even it alters itself and shifts before us. The cats stalk the herbivores straying through the long grass. The eagles hunt the fowl. Buds bloom and then turn to seed. But we Awoken are a fixed point.”</p><p>“You never grieve? You do not fear death? Revile it?”</p><p>“I do,” she says. “Grief and fear were—and are—an essential part of the human experience. We are something new, but we sprang from those selfsame roots. If they had no place in the Distributary, none of the villagers would look for me. I would not have a title, as ill-fitting as it is. The people would not be split in factions.”</p><p>She need not speak the names. Eccaleists. Sanguine. He had ventured this remotely into the east, carrying a faint hope that the schism would not have reached so far, so fast. It was a foolish hope, especially considering he has done so much to help it along. He has not felt any guilt. Except for now. </p><p>“And you, Xio?” he ventures, voice dipping low. “Where do you stand amidst us?”</p><p>“On the ground I find most solid, as anyone does. I think we all tether ourselves to the story that makes most sense to us.”</p><p>He thinks of Mara when she says that. Distant, imperial Mara, who weaves reality and desire-for-reality into a single tapestry, and then sends that unfinished art out among minds with fertile imagination. Mara, who moves in an orbit parallel to his, always near, but never touching. </p><p>“What story do you like best?” Uldren says, setting aside his bowls and loosely linking his hands in his lap. “Are you the sort that wants a happy ending, regardless of how bleak the beginning and end?”</p><p>“What I want will never happen,” Xio tells him, with the ease of a person who resigned themselves to that fact early on. “And because I believe it will never happen, it will not. I’m no leader or prophet. I just listen to the world around me.”</p><p>“You make it sound simple.”</p><p>“It is, and it isn’t. Both the Eccaleists and Sanguine have their points. But neither are willing to concede to anything.”</p><p>“Some momentum is needed to break homeostasis,” Uldren says, and she quirks a dark brow at him.</p><p>Xio tilts her head at him, as though he’s made a perplexing remark. “What it will bring is war.”</p><p>“There are things worth fighting for.”</p><p>“No doubt.” She gently scratches at the downy feathers of the eagle’s head, and he shuts his eyes in pleasure. “The Awoken may have forgotten death, Uldren,” Xio goes on, “but death has not forgotten us. Entropy is everywhere, transforming matter from state to state. Are we capable of surviving the remembrance?”</p><p>“That is the right question,” he says, thumbing at his knee.</p><p>“It is, isn’t it?”</p><p>“What will you do, if it comes to that? War, I mean.”</p><p>“What anyone else would,” she says. “Try to protect what is important to me.”</p><p>He laughs. It’s short and bitter. “That’s not what anyone else would do.”</p><p>“Then I have been living apart from the general populace long enough to have lost track of the moral standard,” Xio retorts. “Just as planned.”</p><p>“Ah. So that was your aim all along?”</p><p>“Precisely. It panned out.”</p><p>She gives the eagle another treat, looking on as he devours it with enthusiasm.</p><p>“Uldren.”</p><p>“Mm?”</p><p>“If you <em> had </em> named him,” she says, attentive and deliberate, “what would you have chosen?”</p><p>He considers, for a very protracted pause, whether he wants to tell her or not. Whether he wishes to divulge a piece of him that is personal and private, and that he has not verbalized to himself or his family.</p><p>“Azar,” he is saying before his thoughts truly conclude. “I would have chosen Azar.”</p><p>Xio smiles that rising-dawn, garden-plenty-smile again, a slow unveiling of tenderness that could become affection. He doesn’t mind it.</p><p>“Beautiful,” she says warmly. “Strong.”</p><p>He stares at his eagle, so happy in receiving Xio’s careful attentions, who will be gone in another handful of years. At the elegant swoop of the neck joining the scapulars. The glisten of the blue-black plumage. </p><p>Yes, it would have been a fitting name.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0016"><h2>16. NEW LIGHT (II.I)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>we're almost at 300 hits and that makes this writer mushy</p><p>also would you rather i update as i finish chapters, or build up a couple and then update every day (i literally have no clue what i'm doing with chaptered things that have more than two installments hahaha) ｡ﾟ(TヮT)ﾟ｡</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Crow learns, and very quickly, that the Guardian is a woman of few words.</p><p>Her Ghost, who is perpetually buzzing around her like a tiny black star, acts as her voice. He’s the one that Crow and Glint have most interaction with over comms—Tau has a sharp sense of humor, and a wealth of snide opinions that are just a single near-death experience away from spilling out. He and Glint are particularly awful together, chattering away like old fishwives; Crow has heard everything from dense debates on obscure metaphysical topics to belligerent trash-talking of the Hive. The latter, he is pleased to note, has been particularly pronounced in the last few days.</p><p>That being what it is, he has, selfishly, deliberated about whether the Guardian’s silence has to do with him or not. </p><p>He’d seen the way she looked at him, when she first saw his face—that expression is frozen in his mind, a graven image that sometimes flares to life when he shuts his eyes. </p><p>In the beginning he’d thought it was more of the same: anger, furious misery, pain, the desire for retribution, which would possibly end with a(nother) hole blasted into his head. And then he’d realized her rage was reserved for Spider—for the Wrathborn, that she cuts down like chaff, that she blasts away into oblivion without blinking—for everyone, it seems, except him. </p><p>That… that had been new.</p><p>She hadn’t been angry, no. She’d been grief-stricken. Suffering. He’d somehow known beyond any doubt that she recognized him, as the others did, but it hadn’t been the same. Worse, maybe. She hadn't shouted or turned on him, just clammed up and done her best to quash any of her instinctive reactions. Several times, he's caught the start of a flinch, or a split second of hesitation, during their non-combat dealings. On the field, she operates like a well-oiled machine. Off it, she acts like he might disappear if she takes her eyes away from him for more than a minute.  </p><p>He already respects her too much to ask about it. </p><p>Glint has all but forbidden it, anyhow, or tried to. It must have to do with whoever he’d been in the past, that dark figure whose actions haunt and dog his every step. But the Guardian is extremely—he would even say frustratingly—patient with him, and she proves that constantly through her actions, despite her general wordlessness.</p><p>Crow has heard her voice on just a handful of occasions. It’s even and clear, with a timbre that reminds him of resonant glass. He would gladly listen to her reading a shipping manifesto aloud, honestly. He’ll never admit that to anyone, including up to and <em> especially </em> Glint. His Ghost would <em> not </em>let him live it down. Ever.</p><p>“Hello? Glint to Crow! Are you receiving this transmission?”</p><p>He blinks—Glint is spinning in front of him excitedly, eye winking with light.</p><p>“Uh,” Crow says intelligently. “Yeah. Sorry. What is it?”</p><p>“Tau just pinged me. The Guardian’s here,” Glint says. “And she’s brought what looks like a completely charged set of lures.”</p><p>It’s been a <em> day </em> since they saw her last, and charging the lures isn’t exactly a speedy task. Does this woman sleep?</p><p>Well. He’d be outright lying if he said he’s not ecstatic at the idea of getting out of Spider’s dank lair, and so soon. He moves from his workbench to grab the necessities—his utility belt, a couple of extra knives, his favorite shotgun. He checks to make sure everything is in place before making a duck for the exit.</p><p>Outside, the Guardian is waiting leaned against her Sparrow, slender arms crossed, featureless and forbidding in full Warlock armor. </p><p>Not a stitch of her skin is visible, not even at the seam where her helmet meets the neck of her robes—she dresses in dark colors, mostly purples, some blues, always iridescent with latent Light. The absence-presence of Void clings to her wherever she goes: it’s practically a magnetic pull, not readily noticeable at the start, but he can pinpoint it right away now, after having spent a week and a half in her company. At times it feels like she’s slowly depleting a room of oxygen and space just by standing in it.</p><p>She fights primarily with Void, from what he’s seen, but she’s fond of Arc, too. On days that she favors Arc, the scent of ozone remains on her robes and weapons, and static electricity crackles at her every touch.</p><p>The only energy she seems to pass on using is Solar. Their partner in crime, Osiris, gravitates toward the fire and the light, the destructive, nurturing potential of dawn and its effigies, but the Guardian prefers quieter approaches. That’s not to say she’s without any bombast entirely—she can make as much noise as any other Lightbearers. She just chooses to do it minus the yelling. </p><p>Glint zips out ahead of him, taking a zigzag path to the Guardian and Tau. “Hello!”</p><p>“Glint,” Tau greets. “Gonna be dragging you out there again today.”</p><p>“Oh, it’s <em> fine. </em>You should’ve seen how big a hurry Crow was in.”</p><p>Crow flicks his Ghost out of the way with his fingers. “Nobody asked.”</p><p>“I thought it was sweet,” Glint says, absolutely shameless. </p><p>Crow wishes choking Ghosts was possible. He clears his throat loudly and ignores the remark entirely. “Hey, Tau. Guardian,” he says, addressing them both in turn.</p><p>The Guardian acknowledges him with a dip of her head, before turning and climbing astride her Sparrow. It’s a very economically-designed vehicle, no extra frills included—he thinks it suits her.</p><p>“Cryptolith isn’t far,” Tau informs them, “though I’m sure you remember. See you there in five?”</p><p>Crow nods, and pulls his own ride out of transmat. “Works for us. We’ll be right behind you.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0017"><h2>17. NEW LIGHT (II.II)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>1 comment = 1 crey</p><p>(thank u for 300 hits love y'all)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He tracks the Guardian’s path through the scope of his rifle. </p><p>She moves with practiced stealth, that liquid grace Warlocks seem to embody effortlessly; every now and then she blinks out of existence in a whorl of Void Light, only to appear behind better cover or on higher ground.</p><p>The cryptolith is surrounded on all sides by more of the strange, twitching Eliksni that Crow has come to hate, and pity, and mourn—if the Guardian has any such compunctions, she is excellent at concealing them. She barely gives any of the afflicted a backward glance. </p><p>Glint has made vague allusions to her achievements, the wars she’s fought, the enemies she’s toppled—Crow doesn’t want to imagine the kind of nightmares she’s faced if the rabid frenzy of the Wrathborn leaves her cold. </p><p>From what he’s seen of her, she is serious to a fault, always composed and buttoned-down, wound tight with tension; it’s obvious that her mind is crowded with composition of thought and strategy, and a relentless drive to fight, fight, <em> fight. </em> She is perpetually in motion, whether she’s leaving or arriving—he can’t recall an instance where she wasn’t engaged in work, reconnaissance, or loadout maintenance. Staying busy is a cover, a distraction. But he thinks beneath it all, she must be very sad. And very tired. </p><p>Sometimes, when she believes no one is looking, or she no longer cares if they are, she puts her hand over her heart—at first he’d thought it was a tic, or perhaps just an involuntary habit. </p><p>Then, one day, under the dim lights of his workshop, while they’d been puzzling over the composition of the lures together, she had (shockingly) removed her helmet; and he’d seen the glimmer of a silver chain around her throat. Suddenly, horribly, her little repetitive gesture had made sense, and he’d inexplicably felt as though he had intruded on a place both private and precious—and ashamed that he’d even considered the possibility of her being inured to suffering. </p><p>Monsters don’t keep mementos, they hoard trophies. The gossamer necklace she painstakingly hides under her armor is not a trophy.</p><p>That afternoon had made it plain to him that she was and is not unmoved or unaffected, but rather exhausted. Depressed. <em> Numb</em>. That humanizing reality had hit him so hard that he’d mostly forgotten how to speak to her without tripping over his own tongue. The overwhelming idea that he’d learned something he shouldn’t have had <em> not </em>helped. </p><p>Thankfully, that’s not a problem anymore. </p><p>Though the Guardian is selective about talking, she is not unresponsive. He finds it troublingly easy to share his thoughts with her—his real, unfiltered thoughts, his small gratitudes, and what matters to him. She doesn’t judge. She doesn’t look at him like he’s a mistake. It’s… freeing.</p><p>Crow has perched himself many yards up and away from where the cryptolith is growing, twisted and bulbous, from the sandy ground; he’s lying on his stomach close to the edge of a rocky overhang with the sun behind him, watching the proceedings with a sniper’s precision. He has several other spots picked out for when their quarry will eventually figure out where his shots are coming from—but for his current purpose, this is adequate. Until the Guardian deploys the lure and summons the leading Wrathborn, he’s going to stay put.</p><p>The comm channel crackles in Crow’s ear. Tau’s voice comes through. </p><p>“Almost there. You ready?” the Ghost asks. </p><p>“All clear up here,” Crow replies. “Good to go whenever. I’ll cover you.”</p><p>He doubts this particular Guardian <em> needs </em>the help, but Crow likes being useful.</p><p>“Alright,” Tau says. “Heading in.”</p><p>The Guardian leaps from the boulder she’d been crouched on and makes a gliding descent, tendrils of the void curling around her legs and waist. She makes that controlled use of Light look like child’s play, as though fighting and defying the very flow of gravity is second nature—for veteran Guardians, it must be. He hopes to reach that level of mastery someday.</p><p>She touches the ground lightly, the toes of her boots making miniscule grooves in the sand.</p><p>It takes her approximately two steps to reach the crawling roots of the cryptolith. The lure solidifies in her outstretched hand, suggestion taking shape. She jams it, point-first, down into the earth, and the screaming begins. </p><p>Crow takes aim. </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0018"><h2>18. NEW LIGHT (II.III)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>
  <i>overprotective warlock noises intensify</i>
</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The Wrathborn is a colossal Servitor.</p><p>Corrupted Ether weeps from the widened segments of its plates—the Hive infection has split them open, turned them into gaping fissures bursting with tumors and shrieking soulfire. It is hideous and pitiable and looking at it makes him sick.</p><p>The hissing, whispering song of the cryptolith burns—Crow’s eyes water, and his temples pound, but he stays the course, picking off the Dregs and Vandals that try to stop the Guardian from engaging the Servitor. He can’t lose focus.</p><p>She is a blur of Light, switching seamlessly between Void and Arc, vaporizing anything that comes too close; the arrows of her elegant bow are tipped with Void, too, a fast-moving poison that jumps from enemy to enemy, spreading among the Elkisni in an explosive plague. He’s not certain whether to be afraid or awed—some mixture of both is probably in order. He personally finds bows less reliable than other weapons available to him, but the Guardian carries one into melee combat with no apparent inhibitions. </p><p>The rest of her loadout is just as deceptively light: a toothy submachine gun that bristles with Arc, and a thin, hooked sword that she keeps strapped to her back. The end will be near when she draws that wicked blade—she deals death as a reaper with it in her hand.</p><p>Crow is used to the brawler-guerilla-blitzkrieg tactics employed by Spider’s mercenaries—witnessing her fight like dancing, weaving evasion, forever a prediction ahead, is an almost alien experience. </p><p>For a long, painful time, he has been aware of Lightbearers, and the scope of their skills, but he hasn’t had any prolonged exposure to them or their methods. He is self-taught in every way. The contrast has never been starker to him. Or maybe that mental hyperaesthesia is because she’s a scholar-warrior-arbitrator of strange, occult laws, and that has to be universally confusing; even enterprising Spider occasionally has trouble parsing the whole meaning and scope of <em> Warlock</em>.</p><p>He puts a round in the back of a juddering Vandal that is too fixated on the Guardian for his liking. It stumbles. The next slug goes through its skull, shredding helm and hide.</p><p>The Guardian makes vicious use of the space he creates with his shots, exploiting each weakness with a ruthless efficiency that excites him. But she moves faster still when a detachment of mutated Dregs decides on trying to reach his perch—they don’t have much success, scrabbling on the rock, and he begins to sit up so he can move to one of his backup locations.</p><p>“Crow, get down!” Tau yells.</p><p>That’s all the warning he gets before an immense globe of Nova Warp slams against the basalt, overtaking the Dregs in a tidal wave of blistering void. His reflexes kick in just a second prior to impact: he drops like a weighted bag, and he doesn’t lose the grip he has on his rifle, but he feels each shuddering shockwave through the soles of his boots, his spine, deep in his chest—every hair on his arms and neck stands on end as his body reacts to his staggering proximity to total annihilation.</p><p>The heady<em> wub-wub-wub </em>of weaponized Void recedes as he lies there, attempting to understand the Guardian’s visceral reaction to a threat to his safety. This isn’t the first time it’s happened, either—just the most conspicuous. He doesn’t think it’s because she believes he can’t defend himself. He doesn’t know what to think, really. </p><p>The comms channel blips.</p><p>“You alright?” Tau says.</p><p>“Yes,” Crow replies, sitting up slowly. “We’re both fine.”</p><p>Tau sighs in clear relief. “Good.”</p><p>Crow peeks over the edge—since he’s not in immediate danger of being torn to pieces anymore—and surveys the carnage the Guardian has left behind. The broken bodies of half-dissipated Wrathborn surround her; she is the eye in a storm of worm-blood and Ether.</p><p>The infected Servitor is nowhere to be seen.</p><p>It must have fled already, like they all do when they are near death. There’s a dispiriting monotony and repetition to these hunts: this type of prey does not deviate or act unpredictably, ever. Xivu Arath has wiped her subjects clean of any will or independent thinking. Their self-preservation only extends as far as survival, to fulfill the conditions which will allow them to exist long enough to fight again. They feel no fear, no despair, no regret.</p><p>Crow shivers under his cloak.</p><p>“I used to think that these poor Eliskni could be saved, or… redeemed,” he confesses to his comm device. “But now I’m not so sure.”  Glint materializes and settles on his shoulder, a balm to his anxiety. “When I look in their eyes, I don’t see Fallen. All I see is the darkness of the Hive.”</p><p><em> Beep</em>. The comms channel regains one of its dormant participants. </p><p>“Do you cling to your belief in redemption for them, or for yourself?” Osiris asks. </p><p>Of <em> course </em>he was listening. Osiris is always listening.</p><p>Crow doesn’t like the burble of shame and automatic irritation that single sentence causes him. </p><p>So he keeps his mouth shut—a valuable skill taught to him by his time with Spider—and focuses on stowing his rifle instead. The Guardian will set about tracking the remaining Wrathborn soon, and he should be prepared to shadow her.</p><p>Static in his ear. Another barb?</p><p>“Crow,” says a new voice, soothing, a little raspy. Not Glint, or Tau, or Osiris. The Guardian. His breath stutters. “Osiris is cantankerous on his best days. Sharp-tongued. And now he is grieving, too. Do not let his emotional projections rattle you.”</p><p>Tau laughs nervously. “You are <em> so </em>lucky he can’t hear you.”</p><p>“Speaking from personal experience?” Crow says, after he manages to dislodge his heart from where it’s stubbornly gotten itself stuck in his esophagus.</p><p>“If hours and <em> hours </em>worth of debate while Sagira and I hid is what you mean by ‘personal experience,’ sure,” Tau mumbles.</p><p>Glint whirs with interest. “Ooh, my radars are in overdrive. I sense history.”</p><p>“She once zapped the top of his cowl off, a couple of years ago, because he called her a whelp,” Tau adds.</p><p>Crow laughs a bit before he can stop himself. </p><p>It’s hard to picture the stoic Guardian as an annoyed colleague, but not impossible. Osiris could probably teach everyone at least one thing—like the mechanics of the universe, or creative and mystic applications of Solar Light, or, more mundanely, patience, and self-control, both of which are essential to have in abundance if you want to talk shop with him.  </p><p>“I knew it!” Glint says triumphantly. “Only real families zap one another.”</p><p>“You have <em>very</em>odd qualifiers for what constitutes a family,” Tau deadpans. </p><p>The Guardian goes on despite the active peanut gallery.</p><p>“Your compassion does you credit,” she says, and Crow’s heart takes a leaping dive straight down into his stomach, filling the hollow there with flittering, fluttering anticipation, and <em> so much warmth. </em></p><p>“Thank you,” he whispers, eternally grateful that his voice doesn’t shake.</p><p>She doesn’t respond to that, but she doesn’t have to. He is grinning dumbly, and Glint is pressed to his cheek, a reminder that he is no longer alone. </p><p>Crow likes having friends. He likes it a lot. </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0019"><h2>19. DARK MATTER (II)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>All Awoken dream.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It is cold. It is so cold.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her feet are rooted to the ground, encased in ice. A gale-force wind howls around her, tearing at her armor, freezing the air in her lungs, crystallizing her breath. She will become a statue, protruding from the permafrost like a crude nail, trapped in an endless loop of expiring and reanimating. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Across the forbidding blue tundra there is a dying tree, and in its trunk beats a misshapen thing, roiling oily darkness and acid—a heart that is not a heart, circulating corruption with each thudding pulse of its swollen ventricles. Its whispers are a predation, a pinnacle, a pattern. The final equation.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And that tree grows into a sword, whose edge receives and destroys and bestows and devours, an ontological paradigm of perfection. It cuts through flesh and being, being and flesh, severing souls and sinew, feeding on the grand tithe of the universe. Hungry and hungering. Endless, ever-improving, proving power by being the proof.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>On the point of the sword balances a black triangle, a shape sheared from reality, blurring all sense and conscience with its temptations. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She can feel something crawling along her back, dragging thin fingers across her skin. Fangs rasp at her cheek.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Let my will set you free,” it hisses.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wants to bend out of the way of that echoing voice, that wise, hateful, sovereign voice, but she cannot move. She has to stand there as it worms into her brain, eating at her hidden fears and bringing them to fruition.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This is it, then? Is this what awaits her at the end of this journey? Hushed hearsay and subjugation, and a silent drowning in the dark?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But pressure is building over her heart—internally, moving externally, like the composition of her existence is pushing against this artificial, malicious winter, and the Deep that is threatening, looming, consuming.  </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It starts as a spidery, web-fine crack. She pushes. Ice shatters and breaks. Her arms are free, and she instinctively shields the beloved gift around her neck with her hands. It is hot, though it doesn’t burn, and it chases the chill from her veins. How could she have forgotten she was carrying this?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Someone is behind her. She knows who it is without looking.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Remember,” the Queen says, “to defeat the sword by the standard of the sword is to claim primacy. There is more than one path to godhood.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Everything—this dream, the lonely plain, the majestic presence—will disappear if she turns.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Xio swivels on her heel, and waking up feels like falling. She lands on her back, eyes open, the sheets of her cot tangled around her, her clothes soaked through with sweat.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Ghost responds to her distress in nanoseconds, appearing and shining a soft light on her, breaking up the gloom of the apartment.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Xio?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The chain of her pendant is warm.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m fine,” she says, though she is not.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sleep does not come for her again that night.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0020"><h2>20. PROTOSTAR (II)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Uldwyn Sov is in Medical for the third time this week.</p><p>The infirmary has not changed in the slightest since launch, he thinks as he looks around—then again, why would it? The Yang Liwei runs on rules and regulations, most of which are followed down to the last tedious detail and letter. This is why he made it his goal early on to try and break as many of them as possible without blowing anything up. Well—anything <em> too </em>important.</p><p>The usual doctor, one Lana Song, is not on shift today, which is a shame, because her substitute—a kind of dour lady who asks far too many questions and has eyes that are a little too big for her face—is who Uldwyn gets instead, and he curses his luck, because Zinovia Eliades is about as subtle as Mom when it comes to interpersonal interactions.</p><p>“Wow,” she says as soon as she sees his face. “How have you not broken all your teeth yet?”</p><p>Point: proven.</p><p>Talking around a split lip is uncomfortable, but it gets easier with practice. And Uldwyn has had a lot of practice.</p><p>“Good enamel,” he answers, seating himself on the unoccupied berth closest to the doctor’s desk. “Runs in the family.”</p><p>“Yeah, I can believe that. Look up, please.”</p><p>He does as he’s told, remaining stone still as she runs a preliminary scan and tests his pupils’ reactivity to light.</p><p>“No concussion this time,” the doctor says. “Which means you can get back to brawling as soon as I rescue your cheekbones. And your mouth. And—most of your left eyelid, actually.”</p><p>Uldwyn won’t smile. It’d hurt too bad.</p><p>“Aren’t you technically part of Behavior?” he asks.</p><p>“What, you bummed I’m who you have to deal with today?” she says with a chuckle. “Yeah, I am. But I have the qualifications to also treat patients. Don’t worry, I won’t report you.”</p><p>“Why not?”</p><p>She laughs again, the sound echoing in the empty infirmary. “Because Alice already knows about the fights.”</p><p>Hearing that feels like swallowing a rock, or what he imagines swallowing a rock would feel like: incredibly unpleasant—but also sort of horribly amazing, because not just anybody would be able to <em> swallow a rock, </em>right? </p><p>Captain Li hasn’t broken in his cabin hatch to drag him off for disciplinary action, so he figures he’s safe for the time being.</p><p>“Plus, getting Behavior involved would mean paperwork,” she continues, withdrawing two capsules of inert cytogel from the supply vault along the wall. “Captain Li hates paperwork. And so do I.”</p><p>“Professional,” he remarks. </p><p>“Efficient, you mean.”</p><p>“Sure,” Uldwyn says, “we can go with that.”</p><p>“I’m going to apply the gel and disinfect those cuts now,” she announces, walking over to him. “Might sting a bit.”</p><p>He just nods and lets her get to work. </p><p>Her hands are steady but gentle, and certain in their movements. She smells like mint and the initiative-issued soap that everyone uses—clean and fresh, but undeniably artificial. Her white coat is standard, adorned with the badges that mark her as Auturge, Second Class. In the sterile light of the ship, she’s a blot of warm color.</p><p>She’s examining his impressive black eye when he says, “Do you ever bet on the fights?”</p><p>The inquiry doesn’t startle her. She swipes a globule of cytogel over a scrape on his jaw with a gloved hand, back and forth, until the cleanliness satisfies her.</p><p>“Nope,” she says simply. “Probability and I don’t get along. Think she’s got it out for me, honestly.”</p><p>“Some risks can be fun.”</p><p>“I’m certain that’s true for lots of people.”</p><p>“Hm. But you’re not lots of people, are you?”</p><p>“It’s not a big deal, just a preference,” she says, blinking at him. “So don’t patronize me, Sir I-Collect-Supermassive-Subungual-Hematomas.”</p><p>“That was <em> one </em> nail, <em> once.” </em></p><p>“It was the worst non-nail I’ve ever seen.”</p><p>“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Uldwyn says. “Someone has to boldly go where no man has gone before.”</p><p>“And I understood that reference,” she replies, cracking open the second capsule. She goes for his lip next, being cautious of the raw skin there. “You can keep boldly going places so long as adequate medical help is available.”</p><p>He waits until she’s backed off to speak again. “Are you worried about me, doc?”</p><p>“I worry about everyone on board.”</p><p>“That's a whole country's worth of worry.”</p><p>She gives him a cryptic grin. “I’ve got a big heart.”</p><p>He resists the urge to poke at his wounds while she turns away to dispose of her gloves and the empty cytogel packs.</p><p>“I never see you on the recreation deck, or at the canteen, or… anywhere, really,” he muses. </p><p>It’s true. Outside of the confines of Medical, Doctor Eliades basically disappears. He’s seen her in the company of Captain Li, here and there, and he knows she’s acquainted with Mom at the very least by virtue of him constantly being in here—but that’s all. He’s curious. She’s strange, at times stranger to talk to, and since Uldwyn loves anything that seems like a lost cause, that’s interesting to him. It’s almost a shame she coops herself up in the infirmary. </p><p>“That’s because I don’t go to any of those places,” she says as she returns to her seat at the desk. “Not much of a mystery.”</p><p>“But <em>why?”</em></p><p>She crosses her arms, raising an eyebrow. “I’ll give you a cryopack for that bruise. Keep it on until the swelling goes down. Otherwise, you’re all set.”</p><p>Uldwyn stands, brushing off his pants.</p><p>“I’ll find out eventually,” he promises.</p><p>Doctor Eliades laughs. “<em>Goodbye, </em>Uldwyn. Try and stay relatively safe.”</p><p>Okay, then. Challenge accepted.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0021"><h2>21. DARK MATTER (III.I)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>On Xio’s twenty-first day of living in the Tower, Ikora recommends the Crucible as a possible means of stress-relief.</p><p>Xio may be a recent addition to Ikora’s sphere of acquaintances, but she’s been there long enough that she does know that Ikora never says anything without reason. Such a suggestion could only mean she looks <em> stressed. </em>Does she? She asks the Ghost that—he only giggles anxiously and asks her what she wants to have for dinner.</p><p>It has not been easy, adjusting to the City. Not with her memories clinging to her, a film over everything and anything she attempts to do in order to assimilate. She cannot imitate the righteous fury so many—if not all—Guardians feel. Their blind loyalty to the Traveler. Being a Warlock seems to give her some leeway: she is expected to be perspicacious and interrogative, she is expected to have a few screws loose, and she is <em> definitely </em> expected to be unsettling. So, that being what it is, her lurking and general isolation is interpreted as… some kind of higher form of brooding. It suits her, if she’s to be perfectly honest.</p><p>Except for Ikora and the annoyingly persistent Cayde-6, she has passed this month alone. That suits her, too. She has had time to read whatever she’s been able to lay her hands on, and familiarize herself with the workings—or, rather, the profound lack thereof—of the City. </p><p>Of the place itself, her impressions are thus: it is crowded; it is shoddily regulated; it is adequately defensible; and from what she can see from the Tower, most if jt is appallingly built. </p><p>The Tower, unlike the sprawling behemoth of cement and asphalt below it, has a certain charm that she doesn’t mind. Higher up, near the observatory, the architecture is all smooth lines and marble, majestic arches and large, clean expanses of white stone. She haunts the terraces of the Tower North often, hidden away with a datapad or one of Ikora’s books<em>—real books, </em> paper and ink, the sort of which she never thought she would hold again. </p><p>Between those pages lies respite. She escapes into the stories of her once-childhood, that gauzy, faraway realm in her mind. Xio, who used to be Via, who used to be human, appreciates the value of a good story. Of a rousing epic. On one of those hot summer nights, she falls asleep clutching <em> The Iliad </em>to her chest. </p><p>Odysseus was cunning and wretched. He survived, lived to see Ithaca again. And so will she.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0022"><h2>22. DARK MATTER (III.II)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Anyone else would have a hard time interpreting Ikora’s expression. But Cayde-6 is not just anybody else.</p><p>He knows what that thousand-yard stare means. The pacing. The <em> thinking—</em>which may as well be done aloud, because it’s so damn distracting that he can hardly keep his brain on the work in front of him—and he doesn’t need more incentive to be distracted from the large, unfinished queue of reports awaiting him. He enjoys keeping his head attached to his shoulders, and Zavala is going to be inclined to remove it from its handsome perch if Cayde skips out on his homework. Again.</p><p>But Ikora is worried. Not the usual type of worried, either. This is worse than the daily scheduled ruminating. It's ruining his groove. </p><p>After she takes her thirtieth turn about the war-room, he can’t keep it in any longer.</p><p>“Alright,” he says, pointing a finger at her, “you’re gonna tell me what’s bugging you, right here, right now, ‘cos it’s bugging you hard enough that it’s bugging <em> me </em>by proxy, and I wanna be able to sleep tonight. What is it? You always get jittery when you aren’t getting answers—or you’re getting answers you don’t like. So, which is it?”</p><p>Ikora regards him with those dark, deep-as-the-sea eyes, but she doesn’t respond right away. It’s okay. He’s sure he got her attention.</p><p>“Big Blue isn’t here. Whatever it is gotcha this worked up can be admitted in total confidence,” he assures her, and her expression becomes disbelieving.</p><p>“Zavala is not the one prone to gossip,” she says lightly.</p><p>“Firstly: a dirty, spurious accusation. Totally baseless. Secondly: don’t you go tryin’ to change the subject on me. You’re two seconds away from wearing a hole in the floor with your boots.”</p><p>Ikora sighs. Got her.</p><p>“It’s nothing big,” she begins, turning to look out the window. In the light of the sunset, she looks exactly like most people’s idea of a Warlock: shadowed, mysterious, distant. “Just… an accumulation of many little things. A handful of pebbles that may become an avalanche.”</p><p>“O-o-okay,” Cayde says, drawing the word out to let on that she’s pretty much lost him. “Like what? New protégeé wearing you out? Did she end up eating your books like predicted?”</p><p>Ikora quirks a brow at him. “No, Cayde. Xio is not a bibliophage.”</p><p>“You <em> could </em>just say ‘book-eater.’ The Hidden aren’t gonna disown you if you dumb it down for us plebs.”</p><p>“Duly noted. That said, her dietary proclivities aren’t the peculiarities that concern me.”</p><p>Cayde takes a seat on the table, ignoring Ikora’s disapproving gaze. “Isn’t being peculiar, like… your thing? Warlocks, I mean.”</p><p>Ikora shakes her head. “This is different.”</p><p>“Now I’m just picturing her riding ceiling fans or sneaking out in your clothes.”</p><p>“Cayde,” she chides, though there’s a glint of amusement in her gaze. “What I’m referring to is—subtler. When I talk to her, I feel she’s holding back. That she knows more than she’s saying.”</p><p>“Knows more… about what?” Cayde asks, crossing his arms. “You think she’s three Dregs in a robe?”</p><p>“I <em> will </em>throw this at you,” Ikora warns him, lifting the datapad in her hands.</p><p>“I’d like to see you try!”</p><p>“I mean that I’ve noticed a collection of… tiny disturbances. Small inconsistencies. A sense of grave unease. She’s reticent, which is not unheard of in new Guardians, but I’m starting to think it goes beyond simple hesitation.”</p><p>“Fair,” Cayde remarks. “But I still don’t see why it’s got you rattled.”</p><p>Ikora’s face pinches, like she’s in pain.</p><p>“She reminds me of Osiris,” Ikora says at last.</p><p>“Oh. <em> Oh.” </em></p><p>“Yes. ‘Oh.’”</p><p>Cayde’s mechanical-not-actually-real simulacrum of a stomach churns—the feeling of nausea is real authentic. Top notch, really. It’s almost amazing. May Clovis Bray rot in hell.</p><p>That being what it is, Ikora avoids mentioning Osiris under more or less any circumstance, let alone <em> by name, outright. </em> He twiddles his fingers together.</p><p>“That, uh… can’t be pleasant,” he says.</p><p>“It is not,” Ikora confirms. “She’s politer than he ever was, but just as curious. Acutely skeptical. She thought the Light would hurt her. A day ago, she asked me how Guardians know what they’re doing is right.”</p><p>Cayde would purse his mouth if he had a mouth <em> to </em>purse. “And what did you say?”</p><p>“That <em> we </em> have the free will to determine how our duty should be done.”</p><p>“Nice,” he murmurs.</p><p>“She may not have believed me. Time will tell.”</p><p>“You worried she’s gonna try something?”</p><p>“Not truly,” Ikora says, putting the datapad down on the table gently. “She hardly interacts with anyone aside from her Ghost, and you and I. She is quiet—Osiris spoke where others could hear, and didn’t care that his ideas took on a life of their own, that they resonated with others. Xio keeps her doubts to herself.”</p><p>“Ain’t that a good thing?”</p><p>“In many ways, yes. But she has potential, Cayde. She has such Light within her. I could tell the day she arrived.”</p><p>This is how Cayde differs from both Zavala and Ikora. </p><p>While his colleagues possess a frankly insane amount of idealism, he is more cautious. He leaves the risk and the fun stuff for bets and firefights and crazy suicide missions. Zavala and Ikora, on the other hand, repeatedly make the choice to believe in others—or, more accurately, what they believe others <em> could </em>be. To Cayde, that just sounds like a trap and a disappointment wrapped up in a single, nasty package. People are who they show themselves to be, not more, not less.</p><p>Dreaming up anything else is an exercise in self-torture, and Cayde only likes that brand of entertainment when he’s personally arranged for it.</p><p>He’s been called cold for that before. Contrary to what people would conclude if they could hear his thoughts, he doesn’t have an awful opinion of the new Guardian. She’s been passably funny whenever he’s had the time to bother her, and she’s cool to talk to. But he wouldn’t be broken up if she decided to haul ass out of the City tomorrow, or if she called the Traveler an egg and tried to take a chunk out of it. He doesn’t know her, not really. He’s not attached, not like Ikora already is.</p><p>That’s why he’s the Hunter in this establishment, he guesses.</p><p>He doesn’t say any of that, of course.</p><p>“You can’t save someone who don’t wanna be saved,” is what he settles on telling her.</p><p>“I know,” Ikora replies, her eyes lowering. “I know that very well.”</p><p>Cayde gives her his best Thoughtful Exo impression. “Well, I wouldn’t worry. You and that irritating charisma of yours? Gonna win her over sooner or later. She hasn’t got a chance.”</p><p>Ikora chuckles. The fragile moment breaks, shattering under his influence. Much better.</p><p>“Get to work,” she says.</p><p>“Spicy ramen after?”</p><p>“<em>Work, </em>Cayde.”</p>
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<a name="section0023"><h2>23. NEW LIGHT (III.I)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>a huge, huge thank you to everyone who has commented, left kudos, bookmarked, or decided this little story was a good way to pass the time. you all make my heart grow three sizes. ♥</p><p>also: HAWKMOON ARC AHOY!!! the things i did to get this gun's catalyst lol</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He is and is not Uldren.</p><p>A vast majority of things about him haven’t been altered in the slightest—he still spins his throwing knife in the same way when he is deep in thought, still prefers to work with his hands and make repairs himself; he still moves like a whisper, hardly generating any noise; he still maintains his bad habit of refusing to tie up his hair, letting it flop into his eye, still favors certain models of firearms above others, still retains his inexhaustible fascination with cosmic mystery and a greater sense of justice—still is sympathetic to the plight of the Eliksni, the bloodshed notwithstanding. </p><p>He talks the way he used to, before the Reef, before even those last, doomed days on the Yang Liwei. Like he believes in a kind of higher order, and that he wants to see what the world has to offer. Hopeful. Spider’s machinations have not deterred him. As he always did, as she has always known him to, he is biding his time, waiting for the opportunity to strike. He has not changed. And yet he has changed entirely.</p><p>He is cautious, and selective with his trust, but there is so much of it waiting to be given—he is almost guileless, at certain moments, and that glimmer of who he is without the secrets of the Awoken crushing him hurts and relieves her like nothing else. His newborn, developing regard for her feels like it burns, sometimes, sizzling past every kind of barrier she has, cauterizing nerves both real and figurative.</p><p><em> I will fail you, </em> she wants to scream. <em> I will be too late, one day, and you will be gone. </em></p><p>He wouldn’t understand, and making him understand would only harm him. So she does not scream, or cry, or allow herself to speak more than strictly necessary. Anything else would be tempting fate. She is terrified of what may leave her mouth should she leave herself unguarded—an <em> I love you, </em> or an <em> I missed you, </em> or the surely frightening, definitely unhinged <em> I would kill everything on the Shore if it meant keeping you safe. </em></p><p>She cannot, will not, take that risk.</p><p>Sometimes, she knows what he will like or choose before he does himself, and that’s when it’s the hardest to remember that he is not Uldren, or even Uldren as he could have been—but rather, maybe, Uldren as he used to be, some long, long time ago, when Mara’s shadow did not yet eclipse his horizon, and he had not broken and reforged himself inside the crucible of loss. He is simply what he is, stripped down to the barest and basest foundations of his psyche, unfettered by recollection, deed, or title. </p><p>He is Crow.</p><p>In a way, he got his second chance—a new beginning. </p><p>But she is the same, stagnant, stranded on the shore of memory. Yes, memory—her heaviest burden. She has no one to share it with, now, not the way she did with him. She had been at his side longest, trusted him more than others. And now she is the sole keeper of all those moments, scattered and plentiful, the evidence he’d once been someone beyond the yearning and the darkness. </p><p>Not many remain that hold him in their minds as the person, as opposed to the Prince. </p><p>Petra is one of them. She is honest in her remembrance, bittersweet and dutiful in turns—she misses him, as well, despite everything.</p><p>Jolyon will not speak of it, not without a drink or two or three in him. Dear, brilliant, loyal Jolyon. He has always been too direct a person for life in the Reef. He has always hated secrets. He has always taken each of his losses deeply, personally, letting them tear through him; and he has always blamed himself. </p><p>Mara… Mara had known it would happen as it did, of course—treated the situation as she did all else, the only way she believed she should, like it was part of an infinite game of variables endlessly causing reactions in each other, in their environment, across the board. To her, Uldren’s violent end had been an inevitable conclusion to a path that had shaped itself immediately, intractably, inescapably. </p><p>As time goes on, the line separating Mara and the Queen grows thinner. Mara speaks as the Queen to hide her compassion, what few mortal failings she has left: but, ironically, the Queen is very like Mara in that she wields her plausible deniability as a shield, that she divorces herself from responsibility of an outcome when her influence ends unfavorably, unfruitfully. In a way, she is still the young woman living on the Yang Liwei’s hull, floating out there among the stars, recording a little literal death on her sensorium. Still claiming ignorance of her own power and its reach. </p><p>They’d spoken of Uldren, briefly, during the last meeting facilitated by the Oracle Engine—to Xio’s surprise, it had been Mara who had brought him up in the first place. She should have recognized then that Mara was putting an end to a discussion that had not even started, answering a question Xio had not yet asked.</p><p><em> How did he die? </em>she had inquired. She had no actual need to do so—she had already known. She had wanted to hear it.</p><p><em> It was quick, </em>Xio had answered.</p><p><em> My brother was strong. Clever. Devoted. But… suggestible, </em>she had said to Xio. She had chosen that word to offset the praise preceding it purposefully, with finality, to communicate the Queen’s judgement and sentence, and her rare, very imperfect anger.</p><p>With Mara, it’s never certain if the hurt is intentional, or a byproduct of the Queen’s arctic objectivity. Does intent even matter, when something cuts that deep? Xio doesn’t know. She doesn’t think Mara herself knows—the closer the Queen comes to achieving her goals, the farther away the rest of her drifts. </p><p>Xio can understand why Sjur's adoration went from ardor to worship. How can you love a god, except at a distance?</p><p>The love that blooms between people is different—it is immediate and near, a tangled web of delights. It is accepting the terrible danger that someday those wonders may be taken from you, or that they may fall apart in your hands—it is giving another the best possible chance to wound you. And if a being can be wounded, are they truly a god?</p><p>Xio has the answer to that. </p><p>That is why she will love him, and what she remembers of him, and who he is today, because someone should, because she is cut out for lonely work. Because the beautiful Hunter of the Distributary does not deserve to be forgotten—because he’d led her out of the labyrinth she’d made for herself, and given her courage. </p><p>It is not easy. It never will be.</p><p>No word in any language would ever be capable of describing the sorrow of him looking at her and not <em> knowing </em>her.</p><p>That, however, is not his fault. It is not hers, either. </p><p>She is sitting on her bunk in the total dark when a text message comes through the comm channel.</p><p>Tau takes form in a micro-nebula of misty Light.</p><p>“It’s from Crow,” he informs her. “He wants to meet in person. Says it’s important.”</p><p>“Wrathborn?”</p><p>“No. Something else.”</p><p>Her first instinct is to leap to the floor and gear up. She stays put.</p><p><em> You are getting too invested, </em> her neglected sense of reason warns her. <em> You are flying too close, too high, too fast. You will pay for it. </em></p><p>She is aware of that—has been since she saw him standing over Osiris, his sword dyed black with Hive blood. There is no universe or reality in existence where she could be indifferent to him—whatever name he is wearing, whoever he is, she cares.</p><p>“Then it must really be important,” she says.</p><p>Tau’s eye winks, and he ghosts against her cheek.</p><p>She brushes her knuckles across his shell. “Set course for the Shore.”</p><p>“You got it.”</p>
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<a name="section0024"><h2>24. NEW LIGHT (III.II)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>something lighthearted for a change!!!!</p><p>because a) we're heading into the fray soon<br/>b) i was in sore need of fluff and comfort after hearing crow whistle the viral song in HELM while i stood there sorting my inventory. i was just minding my business and i got ATTACKED</p><p>this is so late bc i spent the whole day exploring season 13 content lol whoops</p><p>also wtf yall you nearly made me cry with your beautiful responses to last chapter, ily</p>
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    <p>Crow is nervous.</p><p>He can’t really puzzle out why, exactly. It’s not like he had anyone else to go to about his, ah… current predicament.</p><p>The dreams have been getting stranger lately—stronger. Almost like the arrival of the Guardian has amplified them, made them clearer. He’d figured he should keep them to himself, until he began being unable to sleep without falling into another vision. They’re cutting into his rest, eating up his attention and focus, making him sloppy. He can’t afford sloppy. Making mistakes at this point would be like offering up the excuse Spider has been looking for on a silver platter—with a bow attached.</p><p>He’d mulled on who to take the problem to for several nights. </p><p>Crow doesn’t have what you’d call a surplus of Lightbearing contacts. The last time a Lightbearer clearly saw his face, he died with a shattered spine for his troubles. The remaining list is pitifully short: Osiris is discerning, but preoccupied, in mourning, and Ghostless. Even if he had some kind of solution to offer, even if he could offer assistance without fear of final death, Crow doubts it would come separated from his distrust of the Traveler. That had effectively ruled him out. </p><p>Crow knows no one from the Tower, and Spider wasn’t even an <em> option</em>, let alone an option worth considering.</p><p>That had left him with two alternatives: try to decipher whatever is going on by himself, or bite the bullet, so to speak, and contact the Guardian.</p><p>The very austere, mostly mute, inscrutable Guardian that treats him with a bizarre, almost frosty professionalism.  The Guardian that apparently (according to Glint) practices deicide as something of a hobby. The Guardian whose face he has only seen twice, but already memorized. </p><p>He’d sent the message requesting a meeting close an hour ago—logically, he knows agonizing about it won’t do any good. It’s done. Can’t be taken back. Yet that sound rationale does absolutely zilch to stop the squirming in his stomach.</p><p>The response to his memo had been prompt and to the point: <em> We’re on our way. </em></p><p>And now he’s waiting, seated at his workbench, the tweaks he was making to his shotgun stalled and half-done. He can’t seem to concentrate. His hands aren’t being as steady as he’d like them to be. The rattling of the pipework in Spider’s den seems louder than usual—it’s like they’re deep in the belly of a metal beast, listening to the jarring vibrations of its circulatory system.  </p><p>“What are you so concerned about?” Glint says, landing on the back of Crow’s wrist. “They’ve been happy to help before.”</p><p>“I don’t know,” Crow mumbles. “I… don’t understand why she’d go this far.”</p><p>“Maybe it’s not a matter of understanding or deserving,” Glint remarks. “Maybe it’s a lot simpler than you think it is. She might just want to.”</p><p>“You sound very sure of yourself.”</p><p>Glint trills proudly. “Because I am! It’s high time someone other than me recognized your potential.”</p><p>“Potential, huh…?” Crow echoes. “Well, she hasn’t shot me. I guess that’s progress in the Guardian department.”</p><p>“She wouldn’t,” Glint says. </p><p>“What makes you say that?” </p><p>“Just a hunch.”</p><p>“You have a wealth of those,” Crow points out.</p><p>Glint hums. “I’m an <em> exceptionally </em>perceptive Ghost. Cutting-edge tech.”</p><p>Crow chuckles, nudging the Ghost playfully with a finger. “Okay,wise one.”</p><p>“That’s right. Defer to my superior knowledge.”</p><p>“You… seem to know a lot about her, actually.”</p><p>The light seeping through Glint’s shell flickers, then dulls with hesitation. “Crow…”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah. You can’t tell me.” Crow sighs. “Thought I may as well try.”</p><p>He has an endless string of other questions, none of which are going to be getting any answers. Glint can be remarkably stubborn when he wants to be—Crow learned that the hard way. No matter what he asks, how he asks it, regardless of nuance or cleverness or indirect implication, Glint will not budge. <em> The past is past, </em>is his Ghost’s explanation, even though ‘the past’ has broken his pelvis, his face, a myriad of other extremities, and regularly blasts him away on a monthly—sometimes weekly—basis. For the people that see whoever he used to be in Crow, it seems much more like an awful, extant present than a distant past.</p><p>The only exceptions to the murderous rule have been Osiris and the Guardian.</p><p>“Ugh. What am I going to say?” Crow mutters, raking his free hand through his hair. “‘Hi, Guardian, please help me find these places I’ve seen in my dreams. By the way, I’m pretty sure<em> I was a bird. </em>Thanks.’”</p><p>“I mean, that works.” Glint hums thoughtfully. “I forget you haven’t spent much time around Voidwalkers. You’re probably the most normal part of her day.”</p><p>“That’s terrifying,” Crow says dryly.</p><p>“Isn’t it? Besides—she’s dealt with much weirder<em>, </em>I promise you.”</p><p>“I believe that.”</p><p>“Good. It would be literally impossible to make her dislike you. Ergo, no reason to fret.”</p><p>Crow’s eyes narrow, despite the ridiculous, juvenile satisfaction caused by Glint’s declaration. “If you’re going to refuse to give me information, you’re not allowed to bait me with statements like <em> that.” </em></p><p>“What? I’m just telling the truth!”</p><p>“Then tell it less,” Crow insists.</p><p>‘Literally impossible?’ What is that even supposed to <em> mean? </em></p><p>“Alright, alright,” Glint soothes, exuding a pulse of warm Light. “I’m done. I’ve fulfilled my quota of crypticism for the week.”</p><p>Crow snorts. “Glad to hear it.”</p><p>“Instead of wasting your energy stewing, you should put it toward brainstorming other creative ways to get the Guardian to visit. You know you want to.”</p><p>“Wh—<em>Glint! </em> This is serious!”</p><p>“I’m aware,” Glint says, not in the least fazed by his sputtering. “I, too, am totally, a hundred percent serious. You’re both in sore need of friends.”</p><p>“And I suppose this suggestion has <em> nothing </em>to do with the very subtle discussions you and Tau have been having.”</p><p>“This is why you’re the foremost spy on the Shore,” Glint teases. “Your keen skills of deduction are second to none.”</p><p>Crow groans, giving up and lowering his head until his forehead is pressed to the metal of the workbench, and his hood hides everything around him from sight.</p><p>“Crow?”</p><p>“Go away,” he says halfheartedly. “You just gave me approximately ten dozen other things to worry about.”</p><p>Glint bumps at his scalp through the cowl. “You can be so dramatic, sometimes.”</p><p>“Stop trying to set me up.”</p><p>“Never,” Glint says. </p><p>Crow expresses what he thinks of that by lying still and doing his best impression of a statue.</p><p>What could Glint possibly be trying to achieve by throwing him in the Guardian’s path at every available opportunity? It’s not like they’re going to stick together after this—whatever this business with the Wrathborn, and the dreams, and the general impending doom of the known galaxy—is over. He’s going to go right back to being invisible, working on his own, and he’s accepted that; there’s no benefit in drawing out a pointless hope. </p><p>That will only mean it’ll hurt more if his plans fall through.   </p><p>His Ghost bleeps—the sound of an incoming notification. “I really hate to interrupt, but you should probably get ready. The Guardian’s ship just entered the atmosphere.”</p><p>Crow’s body reacts before his mind. He almost trips in his too-quick attempt to get up, fumbling as though it’s the first time he’s tried standing.</p><p>Glint blinks. </p><p>“Not a word,” he warns Glint as he reaches for his bag.</p><p>“I didn’t even say anything!”</p><p>“You don’t have to.”</p>
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<a name="section0025"><h2>25. NEW LIGHT (III.III)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>you guys are going to destroy me with all your sweet feedback and comments!!! we literally passed 20k words and i didn't even NOTICE, lmfao, i was too busy cryin in the club. we're almost to 1k hits too. it blows my mind. thank you so much!!! AAAAA</p><p>that said, i listened to a lot of the datamined voicelines for the rest of S13 today-- and if Amanda/Crow ends up being a thing in canon, i can see myself writing Painful And Wholesome Canon-Adherent stuff, which is my usual tack, but i could go completely canon-divergent too. wouldn't be the first time. <i>I JUST WANT HIM TO BE HAPPY AND FAR FROM SAVATHÛN, DAMMIT</i></p><p>whichever option i choose, i won't stop smashing my keyboard, this i swear</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Glint tells him the Guardian wishes to speak aboard her ship, instead of the den.</p><p>Crow can understand that—every available surface has ears in Spider’s lair, and the Guardian likes her privacy. For whatever reason, Spider seems to grudgingly allow the Guardian to do almost anything she wants—it might have to do with the fact that she could reduce him to a puree of lipids and Ether in under a handful of seconds. </p><p>So when Crow slinks out the main entrance, rifle-bag slung over his shoulder, nobody stops him, not even spiny Arrha, who is lurking in his customary spot by Spider’s throne like a bristling angler fish.</p><p>Crow makes his way to the LZ on the edge of Thieves’ Landing—he hasn’t seen the Guardian’s jumpship up close before: his senses inform him that it is a meticulously-maintained specimen that is in exemplary condition for its age. He somehow knows, instinctively, that it is a Ceres Galliot model. The sharp, winglike edges, its streamlined symmetry, the proud, regal slope of the rudders; they’re all unmistakable. He can see it in his mind’s eye, flying up through the azure blue of a nitrogen-rich sky, silhouetted against the glare of the sun. It’s an elegant piece, colored in the cerulean of a foamy sea—fit for a Corsair.</p><p>He has no idea where the veritable treasury of trivia and expertise concerning anything with a warp drive comes from—he supposes it’s a byproduct of the man he used to be, just like the rest of the reflexive, inexplicable habits and quirks he’s got.</p><p>The entrance hatch hisses open as he draws near, revealing Tau hovering there.</p><p>“Hi,” he greets. “Come on in.”</p><p>“Don’t mind if we do,” Glint says, materializing in an instant. </p><p>The two Ghosts revolve around one other for a moment, a pair of handheld stars caught in orbit.</p><p>Crow walks up the ramp and into the jumpship. </p><p>The hatch closes behind him, blocking out the violet light of the Shore; it’s dim inside, but his sight adjusts quickly. And there’s a scent in the cool air… minty, herbal, and inhaling it makes his heart ache. It smells familiar, smells like the dreams of the Reef make him feel—like he’s missing something. Like he’s forgetting something important.</p><p>The more he looks around, the more he realizes the walls of the middeck are adorned with keepsakes, trailing ribbons and banners, hanging ornaments of string threaded with beads of wood and bone. He recognizes the climbing whorl of an Etheric Spiral; it sits in a pot of Shore soil, growing up a little trellis, its gentle helix radiating red that touches the other decorations. There’s a vertical cylinder containing beautiful clusters of Phaseglass spicules, topaz-white-crystal, and a short pillar of shimmering purple geode that he, bewilderingly, thinks he should be able to identify. He cannot.</p><p>It’s busy, definitely—but not cluttered. He can see evidence of the Guardian’s travels in each corner. A jar of green-gold sand. A hydroponic pod of silky pink grass. She… is everywhere.</p><p>“Welcome,” a quiet voice says, and Crow practically jumps straight through the top of the jumpship.</p><p>He didn’t hear her approach. But there she is, lithe and lovely, the subdermal phosphorescence of her body diffusing in the gloom. She looks—different? He can’t tell why, at first, and then it hits him. She isn’t in armor. She’s wearing a pale kaftan and soft, wide-legged trousers, her bare feet peeking out from under them. </p><p>Wow, she has, uh—skin. And it’s lavender.</p><p>“Guardian,” he croaks. </p><p>She dips her head in acknowledgement. Her hair, dark and glossy, just brushes the top of her shoulders.</p><p>“Here,” she says, gesturing to the narrow hallway at her back.</p><p>He follows her, dazed, into what must be the cabin.</p><p>It’s not a big space at all, illuminated by dim, warm lantern light—the way the Guardian has arranged everything around the bunk, though, makes it appear roomier than it is. There’s a low, round tea table, bolted to the floor, and flat, wide cushions on either side of it. Some porcelain, a set of cups and a beaten pot, with a steaming nozzle, are atop it.</p><p>“Coffee alright?” the Guardian asks.</p><p>“Fine,” Crow says faintly. “I’ll drink it however.”</p><p>The Guardian sits on a cushion, one fluid motion, legs crossing, propping an elbow up on the table. “Milk and sugar in the jugs.”</p><p>“Oh,” he says, feeling thoroughly blindsided. This is the most she’s ever said, consecutively, during any of their time together. “Thanks.”</p><p>She motions with a hand for him to sit, sleeve riding up her slender wrist. The circumference of it would fit neatly in his palm. He drops about as fast as he would’ve if his legs were chopped off at the knee.</p><p>Tau and Glint settle on the middle of the table, an absurd addition to the complement of brunch utensils. The Guardian pours out two cups of earthy brown coffee in the short cups. She adds just a drizzle of sugar to her own and pushes the last cup in his direction. The casual affectation of the whole affair leaves his mind fuzzy. He hasn’t shared a drink like this with anyone, not as far as he can recall, and she’s serving it to him as though this informal overture of friendship is expected of her. </p><p>He’d be repeating himself if he thanked her again, so he just nods and accepts the cup. It’s got no handle, and looks like it’s seen better days, but the enameling is still pretty, shining in certain places like new. The heat of the beverage is an appreciated distraction from the swirling vortex of his thoughts. </p><p>The Guardian lifts her drink and takes a sip. Her eyes, clear as winter ice, are fixed on him.</p><p>“I suppose I should explain,” Crow says, thumbing the lip of his cup. “I’ve—been having these strange dreams lately. Vivid. Real.” He glances at his Ghost, who is watching expectantly, silently encouraging. “Glint… Glint thinks there might be something to them.”</p><p>“All Awoken dream,” the Guardian murmurs. The hairs on the back of his neck stand up, needle-straight.</p><p>He grasps his cup tighter. “I’m flying. There’s a green forest. Mountains.” He wets his lips. “European Dead Zone, I think.”</p><p>The Guardian doesn’t interrupt him. That’s exactly what he needs, because now the descriptions are tumbling out of him, and he is rapidly coming around to the idea that he’d been tense and sick with the necessity of shedding this burden.</p><p>“Sometimes the clouds part,” he tells her, “and where there should be a bright blue sky, there’s just… darkness.”</p><p>The Guardian’s gaze sharpens, but she doesn’t break her silence.</p><p>“I’m free… soaring toward a distant pillar of light. But the dream always ends the same way. That light…” He looks down into the miniature eddy of coffee in his cup, an infinitesimal maelstrom of water and froth. “…Flickers like a candle flame and goes out. And then there’s… nothing.”</p><p>“Omens,” the Guardian says. “It could be a warning. A dark future, yet to pass.”</p><p>“I can’t shake it,” he admits, as goosebumps prickle his arms. “It’s all I think about.”</p><p>She is observing him with a look whose intent he cannot name. “As you should be. You would be remiss to ignore these visions.”</p><p>“You… believe me?”</p><p>“Why wouldn’t I?” she says.</p><p>Listening to her speak without the distortion of the comm channel fraying the fabric of her words is unusual—and pleasant. No static crowds the expanse between them. She’s languid and deliberate with her speech, like she’s thought what she’ll say through a hundred thousand times before letting it leave her.</p><p>“I’ve seen things, too,” the Guardian goes on. “I dreamt of Oryx long before I ever faced him. I walked on Europa before I knew its name.” She flicks a wrist, summoning a tremulous orb of Void. “Lightbearers are already connected to the cosmos on an incomprehensible level by the very nature of their existence—you are also Awoken.”</p><p>“What does that mean?”</p><p>“It means there is a part of you tethered to a cause beyond Light and Dark. A piece that will always be only yours, even as you develop as a Guardian. You will dream again, of other places and times. It is natural.”</p><p>He watches as she shapes the orb with the chisel-edge of her will. </p><p>It splits down the middle, falling open like the halves of a fruit, and from the center blooms a flower with many petals, shivering black framed by an outline of amethyst. It expands, growing taller, until the stalk withers and curls in on itself, disappearing into nothing; the petals fall, oscillating and changing and twisting—and then, miraculously, they are birds, diminutive hawks and crows and sparrows, soaring, gliding, dissipating at the apex of their flight into a shower of sparks. </p><p>“That was beautiful,” Glint says reverently.</p><p>The Guardian glances at Glint with blatant fondness. “Thank you.”</p><p>“It truly was,” Crow agrees. “Your control is so precise. It’s… unbelievable.”</p><p>“You will attain a similar proficiency. Gunslingers like you are not common. I have known only two.”</p><p>A painful knot forms in his throat—he can’t discern if it’s from the compliment, which is large enough to be staggering, or because the confidence with which she delivered that assertion reminds him of Glint, and the circular conversations about the life the Light wiped away.</p><p>“I’m flattered that you even consider me among them,” Crow mutters. It’s not like he has an unfairly deprecating view of his own skills—he’s just precisely cognizant of what he<em> doesn’t </em>have, the gaping cavity where the support of other Lightbearers should be.</p><p>The Guardian tilts her head at him, as though she can follow what he’s thinking. Maybe she does. “Time will show you the truth,” she says. “We Lightbearers have a surplus of that—time. Yet it never quite seems to be enough.”</p><p>Crow hasn’t been around as long as some others, but he understands that paradox of a feeling thoroughly.</p><p>“As for your visions…”</p><p>He gulps down his nerves. Now or never.</p><p>“Would you come with me?” he blurts. “To the EDZ, I mean. See if anything’s there?”</p><p>For a second, her eyes widen in surprise: it’s the most expressive he’s seen her, but the small smile that comes afterward is the real wonder. He hadn’t known she could look that young, or kind. The stony facade of the Guardian breaks then, for good. It won’t be coming back. He’ll remember this instead.</p><p>“Of course,” she answers, and a fraction of the terrible weight on his chest evaporates.</p><p>“See?” Glint says.</p><p>“Shush,” Crow chides him.</p><p>Tau steals a glimpse at his Guardian. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”</p><p>“Most likely,” she responds, her face smoothing into her customary calm. “Crow, I believe I know where to begin our search.”</p><p>He’d finally been preparing to start on his coffee, but that stops him cold. “What? Really?”</p><p>“Yes,” the Guardian says. “Have your <em> kafé </em>first, however, or it’ll spoil.”</p><p>Though the anticipation is turning his spine to steel, he does as instructed. </p><p>The taste is intense, savory-bittersweet, like very dark chocolate and roasted chestnuts blended together; he takes to it immediately. Some sugar would be acceptable—but no milk, not for this. It would throw the whole flavor profile off, kill the richness. He ponders, for a moment, if she set the milk out as a sort of test. </p><p>“This is delicious,” he says, lowering the cup. “Nothing like what I’ve had.”</p><p>“Personal stash,” she explains. The Guardian leans back, blinking those beacon-bright eyes at him. “Now, Crow, tell me: have you been to the Dark Forest?”</p>
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<a name="section0026"><h2>26. BLACK SUN (I)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>officially passed 1k hits last night. y'all are WILD and i love you. have a little Reef Wars, as a treat</p><p>me writing this was the figurative equivalent of stabbing my hand with a fork, going "wow, that hurts" and then doing it all over again. it's day 58490538495 and i still miss Uldren Sov. thank you for coming to my tedtalk</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He’s drifting in the liminal space between dreams and waking. Dozing.</p><p>That is, until the thudding rhythm of someone running startles him straight up. That’s when he remembers why he was forced to lie down in the first place—the bruising covering his body is still fresh, and his leg, well, it’s as sprained as it was when he fell asleep. Uldren hisses in discomfort. He moved too far, too fast.</p><p>A figure appears in the doorway of his bedroom, distinguishing features briefly blotted out by the glow of the hallway lights.</p><p>He knows who it is regardless, though—she’s the only person other than Jolyon who would dare storm his private chambers, and Jolyon is offworld, scouting.</p><p>“Uldren,” Xio Eli says, glaring at him from under the margin of her satiny fringe. “You are a <em> menace!” </em></p><p>She hasn’t even changed out of her Crow fatigues—she must have come straight here from the landing pad, and the thought causes a rather irrepressible twitch of pride. And a tiny bit of joy. She looks splendid—doesn’t matter that he’s definitely biased. The black of the uniform compliments her, and she always draws her hair up in a stern ponytail for work, which just accents the line of her neck, and the pleasing curve of her cheek, and… oh, she’s waiting for a response.</p><p>“Hey,” Uldren greets. Lifts an arm in a wave, ineffectually, like that’s going to blunt the tempest of her irritation. “You’re back.”</p><p>“What were you thinking?” she thunders, taking long strides into the room. She stops when she’s stood by his bedside. “No, you weren’t thinking. You never think. It’s always impulse with you—always the heroics, the derring do, the—the—”</p><p>Uldren smiles at her, the way he knows she cannot resist. “The…?”</p><p>“The <em> buffoonery,” </em>she finishes, collapsing in a veritable heap next to him, careful not to jostle his bound leg.</p><p>“I personally prefer ‘ingenious improvisation.’ Or maybe ‘dashing escapades.’”</p><p>Xio lowers her face into her gloved hands and groans. “Neither of those are a single word.”</p><p>He reaches out to brush a knuckle past her shoulder. She doesn’t budge.</p><p>“Hello?” he says, tugging at her wrist. “Xio?”</p><p>She looks at him, eventually, and the abject misery on her face, a face which is generally adjusted to a default of Flat And Unaffected, starts a roaring inferno of guilt inside of him. Who is he to be so flippant and cavalier when she is plainly distressed at the thought of his safety being jeopardized? <em> Why </em>is he totally possessed by this boorish brand of irreverence that will definitely, someday, bite him in the behind? Scratch that. He knows the answer to that question. He doesn’t really want to examine it further.</p><p>“Wait,” Uldren amends. He peels off her gloves, and she lets him, and then they’re skin-to-skin, grey-to-lavender. “Better.”</p><p>She stares blankly at their joined palms, their threaded fingers.</p><p>“Petra told me you were unconscious when they found you,” Xio says, pressing her forehead to their hands. “They had to pick you out of the wreckage.”</p><p>“Petra is talkative around the wrong people,” he deadpans. “I only got thrown around a little. Happens when you’re dodging a whole enemy squadron.”</p><p>She ignores him completely. “I read the report on my way back. You led them through the Chionic Zone?”</p><p>“It worked,” Uldren defends, but his indignance dies a quick death at her frosty regard. “I mean—mm. Yeah. That was… I did that.”</p><p>“Yes,” she says stonily. “You did.”</p><p>He skims her forehead with his nose, a caress that’s barely there, trying to get her to look at him again. It succeeds. She gazes at him with glistening eyes. It’s a miracle—he didn’t believe he could possibly feel worse, and yet here he is.</p><p>“Xio,” he says softly. “I’m okay. I wasn’t hurt.”</p><p>“Not today,” she replies in a whisper. “Not this time.”</p><p>“I destroyed the main comm relay, as planned, and made it back in one piece,” Uldren assures her, squeezing her hand. His bandaged leg throbs, as if in reminder. “Well—mostly in one piece.”</p><p>“You’re too important to lose,” she murmurs. “If…”</p><p>“To what would have been Kelda Wadj’s unending regret, that’s not going to happen,” Uldren says, firm and confident. “You won’t lose me. I’ll be bothering you forever.”</p><p>Xio leans into him. </p><p>The scent of metal and ozone and space—acrid, smoky, a bit red, like the tang of berries, and burnt protein—is adhered to her; it’s in her hair and on her clothes, on her skin, and her lips. He tastes it when she kisses him, slow and steady, lingering. He reacts in kind, using his free hand to cup her cheek, to feel the tangible warmth of her. The lengthy missions, the strike runs, the sabotages and ambushes and endless reconnaissance—it’s all kept them physically apart for months at a time, and he finds he much prefers having her this close than staring at grainy holographic afterimages of her.</p><p>When he draws back, she trails after him, chasing for more.</p><p>He laughs in a low voice, husky with yearning.</p><p>“See?” he says, his mouth a feather’s breadth from hers. “Very much alright. And functioning.”</p><p>She halfheartedly thumps a fist to his clavicle.</p><p>“You’re a cad,” Xio mutters.</p><p>He presses a second kiss to the crown of her head. “Been called worse.”</p><p>“I don’t know what I’d do without you,” she admits.</p><p>“You’ll never have to find out.”</p><p>She winds her arms around his waist, loosely, and nestles near. “This war has taken so much from us already. Entire planetoids gone. Thousands lost.”</p><p>Uldren reciprocates the embrace, burying his nose in the crook of her neck. He could stay like this for hours.</p><p>“I’m still here,” he says. “You are, too.”</p><p>“By some miracle.” Xio turns her ear to his chest and listens for a spell. She’s tracking the sound of his heart, and her quiet focus humbles him. “I won’t ask you to not take risks. None of us can promise that.”</p><p>Uldren snorts, and she pulls away to stare at him. “You wouldn’t ask me anyway. Your surplus of honor and self-denial wouldn’t allow it.”</p><p>“If those are such awful qualities to have, what does that make <em> you </em>for shacking up with me?”</p><p>He waggles his brows at her. “Adventurous. Generous. Magnanimous. A masochist.”</p><p>“I can confidently attest to one of those being true.”</p><p>“Is that any way to speak to your Prince?”</p><p>“Do shut up,” she says affectionately. “Funny how my Prince remembers his status rather selectively.”</p><p>He hums, thumbs digging into the tightly woven fabric of her uniform. “It has its uses.”</p><p>“You’re <em> injured, </em>Uldren,” she berates him. That’s his Xio—catching on instantly.</p><p>He smirks at her. “I wouldn’t be using my legs.”</p><p>She gives him her trademark disapproving stare, an expression that routinely cows recruits and trainees into instant obedience. What luck that Uldren is neither.</p><p>“I’d prefer to talk about how you crashed your third jumpship in as many months,” she says, poking him with her index finger. “You’re going to explode your way through the entire fleet if you keep this up.”</p><p>“I’m an excellent pilot,” Uldren says, with what he hopes is great conviction. “I attain results.”</p><p>“And yet you handle your poor ships with the grace of a charging Centurion.”</p><p>“Ouch,” he remarks. “Are you sure you love me?”</p><p>“Petra thinks you should be banned from the hangar for a while,” she goes on, sidestepping the question expertly. “The engineers and I have to agree.”</p><p>“Emissary Petra Venj apparently needs a refresher on etiquette.”</p><p>Xio reaches up and yanks on his ear, making him yelp. “Don’t you dare! You <em> know </em>she would take it seriously and have a crisis about whether she caused real offense or not.”</p><p>“Xio, that stings!”</p><p>“That’s the point of punishment, Uldren,” she says grimly, giving the ear a wiggle for good measure. “Deterrent.”</p><p>“I just don’t want her unnecessarily worrying you, that’s all,” he clarifies. </p><p>Xio’s brow furrows. “Anybody with a speck of brain matter between their ears would worry about you.”</p><p>“Your faith in me is honestly stunning,” Uldren says with a wince.</p><p>“Promise me you won’t bully Petra.”</p><p>“Have you met her? She is incapable of being bullied.”</p><p>“Promise.”</p><p>“Fine, fine,” he concedes at last. “I promise. Now release your hostage.”</p><p>He shakes off her pinching grasp the minute she loosens her grip, already moving to retaliate. Uldren drops his arms, hooks them around her middle—</p><p>“Uldren, no—!”</p><p>—and pulls.</p><p>They tumble back onto the mattress together, and despite the twinging in his ribs, he is massively pleased with the outcome: Xio is plastered to his front, as motionless as he predicted she would be, because she’s a conscientious woman who doesn’t want to aggravate his aches and pains any further, and he’s a bastard who is perfectly unopposed to taking advantage of that. She’s truly too nice to him for her own sake.</p><p>“I haven’t bathed,” she mumbles, unhappily, though she doesn’t remove herself.</p><p>He tangles his unharmed leg between her own. “Don’t care.”</p><p>“I still have my boots on.”</p><p>“Don’t care.”</p><p>She sighs for five seconds. He counts.</p><p>“You’re going to have to change your sheets,” Xio says into his shirt.</p><p>“There are plenty of spares.” He hugs her, stroking her back, trying his damndest to imprint the sensation of her presence like a brand on his mind. “No spares of you.”</p><p>“Why, Uldren—that was actually sweet.”</p><p>“I can be sweet,” he protests, bumping his chin to her scalp.</p><p>She laughs, and the chime of it sends a wash of relief and heat racing through his veins.</p><p>“Finally,” he says. He cranes his head downward to look at her, giddy at the sight of her mirth. “A smile.”</p><p>Xio stares up in return, the light of her eyes shining on him. He sees such unabated and limitless love there, and concern, and a storied trust that comes on with years of companionship. <em> I’ve chosen you, </em>it says. He hasn’t got a clue what he did to deserve that sort of loyalty.</p><p>She frames his face in her hands, using hardly any pressure, endlessly gentle and considerate.</p><p>“You’re safe,” she affirms, wonder in her voice. Her touch traces over his temple, his lashes, his wayward, tousled hair. “I’m so glad you’re safe.”</p><p>“I wouldn’t leave you alone,” he says. His eyes flutter shut as he leaves a kiss on the center of her palm. “I’ll always find my way back to you.”</p><p>Her smile becomes sad. “I want to believe that.”</p><p>“I’m <em> very </em>stubborn,” Uldren assures her. “And you’re very pessimistic.”</p><p>“Been called worse,” she echoes.</p><p>He chuckles and resettles her against him. “Come here. Relax a while.”</p><p>“Okay,” Xio says. She surrenders to his nefarious cuddling.</p><p>“Forgot to ask—your patrol go alright?”</p><p>“Yes. Peaceful, for once.”</p><p>“Just means your next deployment’s going to be a disaster.”</p><p>“Thanks,” she grouses.</p><p>He grins. “Anytime.”</p><p>Xio breathes deeply, letting the tension seep from her. Her fingers curl into his shirt, grazing his skin. She’s wearing entirely too much. But that’s not going to be mentioned—not the right atmosphere. Later. When she’s had that bath, probably, because she’s super particular about that kind of thing. He could even propose to make the tending of hygiene a communal effort. Sometimes his own tendency toward charity stuns him.</p><p>“I love you,” she says, unprompted. </p><p>He’ll never get tired of hearing that.</p><p>Uldren makes a noncommittal sound. “Imagine that. I love me too.”</p><p>She just laughs again, jabbing his thigh with her knee.</p><p>“What?” he says, infusing the word with as much innocence as he can muster. “I do!” </p><p>“Oh, piss off.”</p><p>Right now, in this moment, for a fleeting while, life is good. He is content.</p>
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<a name="section0027"><h2>27. NEW LIGHT (III.IV)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>in this chapter, the three stooges keep a lookout like the darling busybodies they are</p><p>as always, thank you guys, love you tons, you're amazing. ♥ this is a bit of a transitory chapter, setting some things up for Hawkmoon Electric Taken Boogaloo 15 and the interludes of the past you'll be getting in between. hope you enjoy!!!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>They stop on Luna to refuel for the last jump to Earth. </p><p>Even before the Vanguard had reestablished their concerted presence on the moon, Crow avoided it, if only for the obvious reasons of—well, Hive. And more Hive. All the Hive you could possibly stomach, and then some.</p><p>Not much has changed, except now along with the Hive there are Guardians at every turn, bustling to and fro, leaving the base camp on Sparrows or foot, mixing up the dusty regolith and marking it with the prints and tracks of their passage. He’s surprised to see the camp so busy, given the suffocating occupancy of the Hive, the Fallen, and the Vex—but maybe he shouldn’t be, because from what he’s seen, Guardians thrive in adversity, specialize in getting up time and time again, no matter how often or how hard they fall. Here on Luna where the struggle for survival is catastrophic and constant, it might be that Guardians are at home.</p><p>He’s not <em> entirely </em>put out by the choice of venue—he did, after all, get a display of the Guardian’s piloting skills, up close and personal. She handles the Ceres Galliot with consummate care and precision, and watching her land the jumpship was a treat. It’d been smooth enough for Glint to complain about their own landing.</p><p>“Yeah, I’m no Guardian,” Crow had said, “but I got us on the ground, didn’t I?”</p><p>“By that definition, nosediving would have, too,” Glint had grumbled.</p><p>Can’t please everyone.</p><p>The Guardian had saved Crow the trouble of finding a diplomatic way to phrase <em> I should probably stay here in case any of your friends decide to feed me a vortex grenade—</em>she’d suggested he remain on his ship right off the bat, assuming responsibility for the refueling, the maintenance, the general repairs. He can’t understand why her consideration surprises him at this point: it’s been a consistent feature in their every interaction, from the very beginning, persisting through her removed manner and her wary character. She might have been reluctant—cold, even—but she was never cruel, or dismissive. Never condescending.</p><p>He and Glint watch from behind the tinted, aluminum silicate and fused silica glass of the cockpit as the Guardian strides across the camp, to the side of a strange figure overlooking the chasm splitting the canyon beyond.</p><p>“That’s Eris Morn,” says a familiar voice.</p><p>Crow startles, Glint whirs.</p><p>“Tau?” Glint exclaims. “What’re you doing in here?”</p><p>“I’m taking a rarely-offered opportunity,” Tau says, “to speak without being heard by my Guardian. Who, for the record, I completely and totally trust, and that I withhold <em> no </em>secrets from.”</p><p>“Uh-huh,” Glint says. “I completely and totally believe you.”</p><p>Crow cranes his head to look at the second Ghost bobbing by his hood. “What could you possibly have to say that she shouldn’t hear?”</p><p>“She’s not really happy about the aspersions I cast on the belief that she’s anything but a rabid, death-dealing siege engine,” Tau explains.</p><p>Glint laughs, plates spinning around his core. “If you have the reputation, you should work it, I guess.”</p><p>“She does that plenty,” Tau says with a sigh. “Too much, I think. She, um… doesn’t have a lot of others she can entrust her thoughts to, not implicitly. Xio’s great at hiding that, or at least keeping it on the downlow. But she’s one of the loneliest people I’ve ever met.”</p><p>Crow feels something sharp move in his heart at that. Sharp, and vicious.</p><p>“That’s sad,” Glint says, entirely honest. Crow brushes a hand over Glint’s shell, a quiet comfort.</p><p>“It is,” Tau agrees. “She has—a set of circumstances that make it difficult for her to… confide in anyone. We’ve spent weeks and weeks in total silence before. Sometimes I’m scared she’s drifting away from me.”</p><p>Glint touches the corner of his shell to Tau’s. Red-to-starry night. “She wouldn’t leave you,” Glint declares. “I know she wouldn’t. My calculations have determined that she responds to your communications approximately zero-point-zero-zero-eight-point-three-repeating percent times faster than any others—though your neural link does certainly attribute to that—and the only other correspondent that can compete in the same time bracket is Crow!”</p><p>Said Crow coughs, choking on his own intake of breath. It hurts so much that he forgets to ask how Glint could possibly know who the Guardian is in contact with—and the speed of her replies.   </p><p>“I’m grateful, Glint,” Tau says. There’s a smile in his tone. “For your calculations, that is.”</p><p>Glint literally glows with pride. “Nothing to it.”</p><p>“Messages notwithstanding,” Tau continues, “I just wanted to thank you. To thank you both.”</p><p>“Thank us?” Crow repeats. “Whatever for?”</p><p>Tau’s eye blinks as he gazes in the Guardian’s direction again.</p><p>She is still standing by Eris Morn, who has turned to face her. Crow can see, regardless of the distance, the circles of luminous Acolyte green that are Eris’ eyes—he knows of her, tangentially, like he knows of most of the major contributors (and detractors) to Vanguard efforts, if not their joint history. Lightbearers, or former Lightbearers, are forbidden territory, a taboo that Crow is not permitted to explore. </p><p>Spider lives by the tenet that knowledge is power—and Crow has paid for testing the zealousness of Spider’s devotion to that branch of faith. Glint bears the scars. They both bear the fear.</p><p>He can almost put it from his mind when he’s accompanying the Guardian. Can pretend that they’re just a pair of Lightbearers, partners, doing good work for a good cause. It’s a fantasy, but those are valuable amid a sea of nightmares. A rock in the storm.</p><p>“There’s a lot to be thankful for,” Tau says. His shell is spinning slowly, the galactic patterns on its surface moving. “For asking her to come with you, not ordering her. For treating her like a person. For grounding her. For… giving her a choice.”</p><p>Crow’s eyes and nose are tingling rather suspiciously. He clears his throat. “I wasn’t aware I’d been so busy,” he says, without a single wobble to betray how much hearing that meant to him.</p><p>Tau alights on Crow’s shoulder, in the wrap of his cowl. It’s a shockingly friendly—and trusting—gesture from a Ghost that isn’t his own.</p><p>“I haven’t seen her this engaged and present in years,” Tau confesses. “She’s always focused on being a Guardian, and it doesn’t leave her much room for… well, herself. I was worried that she’d stopped being able to look forward to anything. I’m glad I was wrong.”</p><p>“I had no idea,” Crow says.</p><p>“Trust me, we know,” Glint adds, in his usual helpful tack.</p><p>Tau laughs. “She talks more often around you two. So… I suppose I’m also thanking you for bringing a piece of her back to me.”</p><p>“She’s lost a lot, hasn’t she?” Glint asks.</p><p>The Guardian’s Ghost is silent for a little. “Yes,” he says finally. “Yes, she has. Again, too much. It’s not my place to tell you more. She’ll do that, when she’s ready.”</p><p>The conversation peters out, having reached its natural end.</p><p>Crow tries to imagine that—learning more about her. Her, not her résumé. Does friendship, or the idea of it, typically induce such a flood of dopamine? He has no example to go by but Glint. If that’s how it normally goes, he sees how people could get used to it—crave it. Pursue it. He wishes it could last.</p><p>The Guardian isn’t coming back yet. </p><p>He can dream a while longer.</p>
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<a name="section0028"><h2>28. NEW LIGHT (III.V)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>alright, well. HERE IT IS. the LAST OF THE UNABATED FLUFF (for a little bit).</p><p>next time, we're going back to the Yang Liwei, and you're getting more Personal Backstory™. buckle up!!!</p><p>(also, i keep forgetting to mention, the pretty shell i keep describing on Tau is the Cosmos one-- not only an appropriate name, but one of the loveliest in game, too, in my completely honest and massively humble opinion)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It is approximately half past seven in the evening when they arrive in the EDZ.</p><p>The grogginess Crow had been feeling evaporates when he transmats to the twilight world outside. </p><p>The air is crisp—it smells of damp earth and pine and wet wood, universes apart from Luna and its arid atmosphere, and just a single inhale cleanses him of most of the worries he accumulated on the trip over. He loves how quiet and tranquil the EDZ can be—loves that if he goes deep enough into the forest, the whole galaxy and its conflicts melt away like mist under sunlight. He could see himself living here, he thinks, in another life. It would be peaceful. Uneventful. He could make his own adventures, instead of having them thrust upon him. Yeah, that’d be something. </p><p>Anyway—it’s one more desire he can add to his ever-expanding repertoire of woolgathering exercises.</p><p>Crow holds out a hand, palm up. A supremely fine, inconspicuous drizzle is falling. It cools his cheeks and forehead, where it can reach him under his hood.</p><p>The Guardian emerges from the distortion of a transmat field beside him, landing lightly on her feet. Crow himself isn’t immensely tall—but standing next to her makes him feel like a Titan. It’s not that she’s tiny, because she isn’t: she’s just willowy, deceptively slim. Nothing about her physicality accurately suggests the terrible strength she wields.</p><p>He expects her to turn on her heel and set about achieving their objectives without delay. That’s why he’s taken aback when she instead reaches for her helmet. He hears the fizz of the internal life-support systems of her armor disenganging, and then the helmet is gone, revealing her. She’s done up her hair today—it’s been laid flat at the base of her skull in a coiling braid, and it makes her look… a certain type of way. Huh. </p><p>Crow only realizes he’s staring when she tilts her head back, turning her face up into the filmy fall of rain. She shuts her eyes as she does that, and he’s grateful for it—he’d have had to find a comfortable sinkhole to live in if she caught him gawking.</p><p>He doesn’t even know what his brain finds absorbing about her enjoying the weather. It’s not special. At least, it shouldn’t be. </p><p>“Do you want to come with me?” she says.</p><p>Crow blinks the water from his lashes. “Pardon?”</p><p>“I am going to visit someone I know,” the Guardian says, tucking her helmet under an arm. “He practically lives at his post, in the church, just over there. But after that, I was planning on checking up on some old caches—making sure everything is in place. Do you want to come with me?”</p><p>“I…” His entire vocabulary seems to have flown out the proverbial window. Or rather, porthole, given the amount of time they spend in jumpships. He can almost hear Glint screeching at him to accept. “Sure. I… I’d like that.”</p><p>“It’ll only take an hour, perhaps. There aren’t many stops.”</p><p>Crow chuckles. “I’ve got nothing but time.”</p><p>“We can begin our search in earnest, tomorrow, when the sun has returned.” Her authoritative cast fades away, leaving her surprisingly soft around the edges. Like she’s… expectant, but scared to be. “If—that’s alright.”</p><p>“Like I said, Guardian,” Crow repeats. “Nothing but time.”</p><p>She gives him another one of those small smiles, same as the one he saw over coffee in her ship.</p><p>Tau materializes by the Guardian’s shoulder, Light shimmering throughout his shell. “I’ve got Devrim’s bounty of rare teabags all set and ready to go,” he says. “He’s going to be beside himself.”</p><p>“Coffee, milk, sugar, teabags, planetary souvenirs…” Crow lists, feigning deep thought. “Should I be worried about the development of a black market?”</p><p>“Oh, it’s past just plain developing,” Tau says. “Except we don’t get paid, which defeats the purpose, really.”</p><p>Glint peeks out from behind Crow’s hood. “I wish I could eat! It sounds so weird—experiencing a geyser-blast of endorphins upon ingesting organic material.”</p><p>“Yeah, and if you keep talking about it like that, you’ll put me off it forever,” Crow says, pushing his Ghost down with a gentle hand.</p><p>The Guardian shakes her head. “In any case—I’ll return shortly.”</p><p>“We’ll be here!” Glint tells her, as though the Guardian is in danger of actually believing they’ll vanish into thin air. </p><p>Crow guides the Ghost under the lip of his cowl. “Yes,” he agrees, “we’ll be here. Making sure the ships don’t grow feet and gallop away.”</p><p>They watch the Guardian go. Somehow, it doesn’t seem that lonely a sight this time.</p>
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<a name="section0029"><h2>29. PROTOSTAR (III)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>this week in usernames i spotted while in-game, in no particular order:<br/>-<b>savathûn's thong<br/>-savathûn's black hole<br/>-savathûn's pet<br/>-savvy's g-string<br/>-NATHAN, </b>who was duoed with <b>ALSO NATHAN, BUT BETTER<br/>-Elsie's Excellent Exo Tiddies<br/>-My Couch Pulls Out But I D...</b></p><p>i don't know why or how lady Sav has as many fanboys as she does, but you chase your bliss, guys, this life is too short to do otherwise</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The more he looks for her, the more her absence stands out to him.</p><p>The good doctor had <em> not </em>been lying when she said she didn’t go anywhere—she seems to exist solely within the sphere of Medical, and the mysterious, mythical territory of her private cabin. Outside of either, it’s like she’s a ghost. A puzzle. </p><p>Uldwyn has problems with puzzles—he’s prone to getting fixated on them, with figuring them out, whereas Mara completes them, takes them apart, puts them back together one more time, and then never tells anyone that she did so, or what she learned during the endeavor. Mara will give you your things back (your rotator drill, your cytogel dispenser, your own thoughts), and not so much as let on that she’s changed something about them. His sister seems to warp the very nature of everything around her without even trying. And this is why Uldwyn omits any mention of his little evolving ghost-hunt, or that it’s becoming important to him.</p><p>He’s sure Mara knows, anyway. She always knows. </p><p>But the omission will tell her he doesn’t want it discussed, a message sent in total, specific, encoded silence—Mara does love her encryption metaphors. It’s part of her genius convoluted roundabout way of going about life. She will understand him and his forfeit—his wholly ritualistic mimicry of keeping a secret from her. The intent is what matters. It’s not unlike a stage play. Mara enjoys playing roles, spotting cues. She will not miss this one.</p><p>For the last two weeks, Uldwyn has pulled strings to find out all he can about the elusive doctor—he has friends on every level of the Yang Liwei, every section. It’s not difficult to get information from others: sometimes, it’s as simple as telling them what they want to hear. Grateful people are chatty people. He’s reasonably confident in his ability to pry particulars out of chosen targets, which is why he’s convinced Eliades is either an introvert private enough to put the rest of them to shame, or she actually <em> is </em>harboring classified intel that requires her to be virtually fictional.</p><p>Oh, he’s learned things about her—like the fact that Jules Verne is her favorite author, that she considers reading the theses of ancient philosophers (mostly the stoics) fun; that she lives to work and has several (yes, several) degrees, and that when she eats lunch in the infirmary, it’s usually got some kind of meat in it. The crew on the Bio deck like her—especially the cow-thing. Uldwyn knows that she apparently keeps a larger-than-necessary supply of cytogel capsules available in case of emergency, and that she likes to quote Marcus Aurelius to piss her patients off when they ask too many questions or get too personal. That had been mentioned <em> multiple </em>times.</p><p>Yes, Uldwyn could fill a page with the things he’s learned about her, and none of the items on that list would do anything to help satiate his curiosity.</p><p>His failure hangs over him like a cloud, a funeral pall, following him everywhere. He is not used to not getting his way. </p><p>He’s eating breakfast in the family cabin one day when Osana sits down next to him, a steaming mug clasped between her hands, and says, “Why don’t you just talk to her?”</p><p>He chokes on his muesli. And Mara pretends that she’s not smiling, and drinks more tea.</p><p><em> “Mom,” </em>he complains. </p><p>“It would be the quickest solution to your problem,” Osana says, giving him a knowing look. “Sometimes you have to grab the bull by the horns, so to speak.”</p><p>Uldwyn stands up to put his mostly-empty bowl in the sink—and to escape. “I’m deleting this conversation from my sensorium, and we’re never mentioning it again.”</p><p>He makes it to the cabin hatch in record time, grabbing his jacket on the way.</p><p>“Good luck, my dear,” Osana says as he shuts the hatch behind him.</p><p>Mom has a habit of making the most insurmountable issues sound pitifully simple.</p><p>In the end, it takes him about an entire day cycle to decide—he finds himself at the entrance to the infirmary at around 1800 hours, staring at the holographic symbol for Medical flickering over the glossy hallway wall. What is he going to say? Shockingly, he’s not injured, maimed, or hurt in any fashion. That’s his regular excuse down the drain. Won’t she just throw him out the minute she sees he’s healthy?</p><p><em> Come on, Uldwyn, </em> he tells himself. <em> You’ve done stupider. </em></p><p>That much is certainly true, but not necessarily encouraging. </p><p>He musters his courage and strides in. </p><p>The infirmary is exactly as he left it: chilly and painfully sanitary, smelling like recycled air and antiseptic. </p><p>He’s trying to think up how to start a completely normal, non-invasive conversation when he spots her—she’s at her desk, head pillowed on her arms, slumped over a scattered pile of datapads, breathing deep and even. Her cheek is pressed up rather funnily on her wrist, and her expression is devoid of any tension or seriousness. She looks closer to his age like this, and less like a world-weary, reticent doctor. Every time she exhales, the strands of hair that have fallen in front of her mouth flutter. It’s… adorable.</p><p>Uldwyn stands there, debating what to do. </p><p>His good sense, shrunken and ignored as it is, is instructing him to turn around and get gone. The rest of him is insisting that a fraction of payback (for living rent-free in his head) is overdue.</p><p>He creeps over to the desk, as fleet of foot as he can manage, and puts a light hand on Eliades’ back. She jerks like she’s been touched by a livewire.</p><p>“Hey, doc, rise and shine,” he singsongs. <em> “Boo.” </em></p><p>Nothing could prepare him for her reaction. She curls in on herself, arms shielding her head, legs drawing up and to her chest—a foetal position that screams survival and defense.</p><p>“Whoa,” Uldwyn says. “Doc, it’s me—I’m not gonna hurt you.”</p><p>She doesn’t seem to hear him. She’s trembling now, the force of it traveling up from her spine through his wrist, but she still doesn’t lift her face from the protective cage between her elbows.</p><p>“Uldwyn?” she rasps. Her voice is tiny. Frightened. </p><p>“Yeah,” he confirms, trying to level with suddenly feeling like he’s been thrown out of an airlock. Why do his ideas always end up backfiring? “The one and only.”</p><p>She takes a second before raising her head, glancing at him with red-rimmed, wet eyes. Oh, hell. His hand drops back to his side.</p><p>“What… what do you want?” she asks. The effort she puts into getting that sentence out is clear.</p><p>“I was just dropping in,” he says, instantly regretting how lame that sounds aloud. “I, uh—thought I would check in on you.”</p><p>Her blank stare turns into a glare. “Why?”</p><p>That is a <em> loaded </em>question, if he’s ever heard one.</p><p>“Because I never see you,” he replies, in an echo of their last discussion. Whoops. Too late to take that back now. Onward and forward. “Outside of here, I mean.”</p><p>“That’s <em> intentional,” </em> Eliades says, her features tightening with what could be anger, or pain, or distress. “I stay where I stay because it’s safer. I should never have fallen asleep out here.”</p><p>He suspects she’s being that honest about it since she’s not fully awake yet. </p><p>“Safer? Is someone after you?”</p><p>She winces. “No! I don’t—it’s not like that. Don’t worry. It’s all by choice.”</p><p>He’s very familiar with how the most personal of choices can be the worst for you—which is why he keeps his mouth shut. About that, anyway.</p><p>“You should get some rest,” he tells her instead. “D’you wanna go back on your own?”</p><p>She looks down at her desk, perfectly dejected. “I think that would be for the best. I need to close up in here.”</p><p>“Sorry,” he murmurs. “For scaring you.”</p><p>Eliades wipes a hand over her face. “It’s not your fault. Certain things trigger certain intense reactions for me. Nothing to do with you. Just don’t do it again, please.”</p><p>“You got it,” Uldwyn says. He’s happier than he should be at the prospect that she’s not immediately writing him off. “…Sorry.”</p><p>She gives him a wan smile. “You said that already.”</p><p>“Yeah,” he says, rubbing at the back of his neck. “It bears repeating.”</p><p>“I accept your apology,” she says. “But this is where I work, Uldwyn. You can’t visit unless it’s for a medical reason.”</p><p>Here it comes. The shutdown.</p><p>“I have been known to loiter around Observation Deck C on my days off, though.”</p><p>What?</p><p>“What?” he blurts.</p><p>She stacks a datapad on top of another. “Observation Deck C. It’s far enough down that it’s mostly deserted, and the view is great.”</p><p>“Really?”</p><p>“Really,” she affirms. “Come see if you don’t believe me.”</p><p>He can’t restrain his grin. “Alright. I’ll take you up on that.”</p><p>“I look forward to it.”</p><p>Well—maybe he didn’t <em> entirely </em>screw up after all.</p>
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<a name="section0030"><h2>30. NEW LIGHT (III.VI)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>if u wanna get ur warlock talking, just ask them about lore. gg ez, go next.</p><p>been curious, which is your guys' favorite timeline or category? other than the obvious New Light, i'm partial to Dark Matter and Black Sun myself, for reasons that have yet to be published, but i wanna know what interests you most (￢‿￢ )</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>True the Guardian’s word, checking on the caches doesn’t take more than an hour.</p><p>They make it back to jumpships about forty or fifty minutes after sundown, armor shimmering with rain, Ghosts chattering to each other.</p><p>“You going to turn in for the night, Guardian?” Crow asks her. </p><p>She’d come to a stop a couple of steps ahead, back to him; and upon hearing his voice, she turns, the blue light of the Ghosts’ eyes reflected in a crescent on her helmet. He wishes he could see her face.</p><p>Their Ghosts vanish soundlessly.</p><p>“No,” she says. “Don’t sleep often.”</p><p>Crow does a double-take. “What?”</p><p>“It’s difficult. For several reasons.”</p><p>He regards her with concern. “So you’re—just going to… stay up? What are you going to do?”</p><p>“Run patrols,” she answers. “Gather supplies. Sabotage Glimmer mining ops.”</p><p>Crow is no stranger to sleepless nights. But he can’t imagine expunging the activity from his life almost <em> entirely—</em>what kind of damage would that do? </p><p>Lightbearers can suffer the ills of prolonged abuse like anyone else. The difference is that they generally recover from it, should it end in death. Mostly, anyway. He knows that, too. How many times has he come back, fighting for air, struggling under the weight of reanimation? How many times did he die in that first jumpship, his body trying desperately to wrest oxygen from the vacuum around him, while Glint looked on helplessly? How many more times will he die, serving Spider, in his chase for freedom?</p><p>“Don’t you get tired?” Crow murmurs.</p><p>The Guardian tilts her head at him, like what he said was strange.</p><p>“It makes little difference when you are always tired,” she says. “I’m of more use awake.”</p><p>More <em> use?  </em>She does that a lot—speak about herself as though she’s a tool, or a weapon. He doesn’t like it.</p><p>“But you need your rest, and must have it,” she goes on. “We have quite a task ahead of us tomorrow.”</p><p>The ease with which she changes subjects is enviable. He supposes she’s had years to refine the skill.</p><p>“You believe this… shard is a lead?” Crow says, shifting from leg to leg. “It could be what I saw in my dream?”</p><p>“I cannot be the judge of that,” the Guardian says. “When we get there, you will tell us if it resembles the place from your visions.”</p><p>He chuckles dryly. “No pressure.”</p><p>“None at all,” she replies, just as unenthused. “I do think it’s a starting point. There are fragments of the Traveler scattered across the EDZ. I have journeyed to some of them. One fell deep in the heart of what became the Dark Forest.”</p><p>“The light—or Light—in my dream could be an allegory for the shard,” he mutters in awe.</p><p>“Precisely. And, readings from the area have been of interest, lately. Though scanners keep failing, they have been consistently detecting massive spikes in sterile neutrinos.”</p><p>Crow inhales sharply. “The Taken. They’re gathering there?”</p><p>“It seems like it.”</p><p>“There must be a reason.”</p><p>“You will have a firefight or two on your hands, at least,” the Guardian says. “Not that you’re much in need of the target practice.”</p><p>He coughs into a closed fist, so she doesn’t get an eyeful of him preening in direct reaction to the compliment.</p><p>“Whether or not it’s what we’re looking for, clearing Taken out hasn’t ever hurt anyone before,” he adds.</p><p>“Indeed.” She pauses—he can practically feel her gaze on him. “Have you encountered them often?”</p><p>“As often as anyone living in Sol,” Crow answers. “Often enough to know not to touch the black goo.”</p><p>“Good tactics.”</p><p>“Thanks. I try. Why do you ask?”</p><p>“They’re unique opponents,” the Guardian says. She sounds sad, again. “Each of them a weakness sharpened into lethality, a Knife That Cuts. You would do well to bring your biggest guns. The grove will be hiding more than a Shard.”</p><p>He truthfully can’t tell what to do with her cryptic advice, except follow it. This is the woman that fought the Taken King—and won. To say she’s been around the block, martially, would be a gross understatement.</p><p>“I’ll take your word for it,” Crow responds. “What do you mean by that—a Knife That Cuts?”</p><p>The Guardian seems to consider answering him at all, but then she gestures to him to come closer—to be beside her under the wing of the Ceres Galliot, shielded from the drizzle.</p><p>Their shoulders brush as he takes his place.</p><p>“The Hive subscribe to a code they call the Sword Logic,” she begins. Her helmet disappears in a shower of sparks that swirl around her like snow. “It is the method through which they perfect perfection. Under the Sword Logic, that which does not have the strength to survive was never meant to survive. If it cannot impose itself upon reality, it does not deserve to exist.”</p><p>Crow frowns. “That’s… harsh.”</p><p>“It is the drive of a pact they made, long ago,” she says. “A covenant forged in the Deep.”</p><p>“The Darkness?”</p><p>“Yes. It has numerous names.”</p><p>“And the Taken—how do they factor into this pact?”</p><p>“They are the ultimate expression of what Oryx considered to be the pinnacle of Sword Logic,” she explains. “Art and form unfettered by the arbitrary rules and schemata of physics and life. The final Shape.”</p><p>Crow raises both brows at her. “He considered himself an artist?”</p><p>“He was a myriad,” the Guardian tells him. “A navigator. An inquisitor. A killer. A warrior. A King. He once said, ‘Aiat: let me be what I am because to be anything else would be fatal.’”</p><p>“You can <em> quote </em>him?”</p><p>“He was quite the eloquent scribe,” she says blithely, but there’s a deadly serious look, diamond-hard, in her glowing eyes. “His Books of Sorrow are foundational to anyone seeking to understand the Hive.”</p><p>“Hive literature,” Crow muses. “Don’t see how they find the time to do any writing, between all the pillaging, the murdering, and the infecting.”</p><p>She treats him to a sardonic smile. “Crow, that’s what the Thralls and Acolytes are for.”</p><p>He laughs, loudly. “Right. Of course. How could I forget?”</p><p>“I will find it somewhere within myself to forgive you,” the Guardian says.</p><p>She’s actually joking. He didn’t think he’d live to see the day.</p><p>“And I continue to be reliant on your boundless clemency,” he returns, giving her a short, mock bow.</p><p>That’s when it happens—she laughs, too, very briefly, but the sound is like a galvanic shock to his brain. He knows the instant it is over that he would undertake dangerously stupid risks to make her repeat the last two seconds. To see that open expression on her, mouth curved in delight, to be electrified by the inception of her joy.</p><p>If he had realized that talking about <em> the Hive </em>was how to get her to open up, he’d have done it from the get-go.</p><p>She’s staring at him in a way that reminds him of… he doesn’t know, a number of things: a person looking at someone they love; a person looking at a grave; a person in conflict, divided by hesitation and some greater emotional force. For a second, he’s convinced she’s going to reach out to him, or touch him. <em> Something</em>.</p><p>It doesn’t go that far. It doesn’t even start, really. </p><p>He watches every trace of that scintilla of potential die, drain from her, fade and flicker away. She’s reverted to the Guardian he met on Luna, unreachable and silent. What was it? What did he do?</p><p>“Goodnight, Crow,” she says, quiet and low.</p><p>He smiles at her, despite the ache in his chest. “Goodnight, Guardian. See you tomorrow.”</p><p>She nods at him—and then her silhouette flares at the edges with the radiance of a transmat field. It wraps her up, over and under and into itself, until she’s gone, and Crow is left to stand alone.</p>
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<a name="section0031"><h2>31. NEW LIGHT (III.VII)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>girl's got some baggage, don't be <i>too</i> frustrated with her</p><p>(also here's <a href="https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2UyxKRwGjJAJPoxh50diOQ?si=1KygzECFT1Cy5eGgtt3j-w">her playlist</a> that i've had for forever and is sorted in chronological order according to her storyline but is not completed because <i>beyond light isn't on spotify yet, bungie!!!!</i>)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There is plenty to do in the EDZ long after it’s gotten dark.</p><p>She secures the perimeter of the Trostland square twice over, and rids the place entirely of any new growing Dusklight. She plants grenades underneath the angular lattice of drop pods and watches the Void ignite the oil that bursts out of their cells. The Cabal agents within die screaming, cooked inside the hard carapace of their pressure suits. A regular Tuesday.</p><p>Later, she uses a Phalanx shield to break through a reinforced line of Vandals and Marauders holed up in the ruins of an ancient hardware store. Their Shanks swarm her. A knife seething with Arc lodges itself in her side. She catches the Eliksni responsible, and tears its skull to nothing between her hands with the help of the devouring Void. It bolsters her, healing her sundered flesh, sealing the wound around the blade shut. She forgets its presence, honestly.</p><p>When she’s finished, she wanders outside and finds a seat on the lip of a crumbling stone fence.</p><p>“Xio,” Tau says patiently, “you should probably do something about that.”</p><p>Oh. Right.</p><p>She reaches down and rips the knife free.</p><p>“That’s not what I meant!” Tau cries. He makes a series of distressed noises, distorted by panicked static. “Traveler preserve us—wait, wait, wait! I’ll fix it.”</p><p>She doesn’t bother pressing a hand to the weeping puncture. </p><p>Tau wouldn’t let her lose enough blood for it to be a problem, and the pain in the equation is distant, like she’s feeling it through a thick coat of cotton. Dissociation can sometimes be useful. Paradoxically, she is keenly aware of each step Tau takes to heal her: first he isolates the layers of armor and cloth the knife had taken with it into the stab wound—he transmats the the fragments out and away, and then concentrates his Light to slow the bleeding. It becomes a trickle, then a dribble, and then it stops. When that is done, he focuses on weaving together the deep split in her dermis and epidermis, moving yellow fat back where it should be, mending muscle, and smoothing the chipped rib where the tooth of the blade had glanced off. Lastly, he repairs her equipment—restoring the armor from the scans and mats he has stored.</p><p>His Light is warm, comforting, like a pleasant wash of sunshine in early spring. She used to hate it.</p><p>“Better,” her Ghost declares, inspecting his handiwork with a wide eye. “And clean.”</p><p>“Thank you,” she says. </p><p>She’s surprised she managed to make herself talk. The knife, wet with her own blood, is still clutched in her palm.</p><p>Tau makes a quick figure-eight in the air. “What else are Ghosts for?”</p><p>This special, marvelous little drone is her dearest friend in the world, the only one left that is not from another life, not fettered by previous standards, ready and able to help. He knows everything she would ever dare tell another person about herself. He has listened, and been so, so patient. He tends to her hurts, both the physical and the metaphorical. How could she even begin to repay him?</p><p>“I made a mistake tonight,” she confesses, barely audible.</p><p>He sobers instantly, plates straightening, coming to hover right in front of her visor.</p><p>“A <em> mistake?” </em> he repeats. “When?”</p><p>Her fingers tighten around the leather-wrapped hilt, making the fibres of her Aeon gauntlets creak in protest.</p><p>“I was selfish,” she says through gritted teeth. “I disregarded… who Crow is. And who he is not.”</p><p>“Oh, Xio…”</p><p>“I let myself slip. It cannot happen again.”</p><p>“Hey, stop,” Tau says, bumping into her helmet softly. “Is this because you laughed? You were smiling—I could see it. It didn’t look like a mistake.”</p><p>“It doesn’t matter,” she says bitterly. “I was fooling myself, and it’s not fair to him. It’s too easy to forget when I converse with him. It can’t go on.”</p><p>Her Ghost gives her another bump. “You’re rushing ahead. Don’t you think he should have a choice in the matter as well? He likes you. Admires you, even.”</p><p>“If he knew what I’d done, he would not be as eager.”</p><p>The words are spilling forth like poison, drawn deep from a well of sorrow and loathing she rarely lets herself access, lest it overtake her, drown her; but it’s been bubbling up since the day she rediscovered him, trapped in Spider’s web, lost and almost totally alone. The guilt of it had nearly destroyed her. She’d known, somewhere, in her heart of hearts, that putting Uldren to rest hadn’t been the end of it: that is not the way the universe works, that is not the way of the Traveler, who never leaves the things that should be finished with undisturbed. For such a passive creature, it does not seem to grasp the concept of acceptance very well.</p><p>For two years, rumors of Crow had circulated through channels from the Shore, from the Dreaming City. For two years, she had ignored them, too consumed with her own agonies.  </p><p>She had not gone looking because she was scared of what she would find, scared of coming face-to-face with her comprehensive, crushing failure—and he had been enduring needless torment in the meanwhile, on his own. And now she is being indulgent enough to let herself relax in his presence, to imagine herself as his friend, or his protector, or his… </p><p>“You didn’t do what you did because you wanted to,” Tau says, his voice firm. “It all but killed you. I know, because I was <em> there.” </em></p><p>Xio bows her head.</p><p>“If it hadn’t been you, it would have been someone else—and they would have made him suffer.”</p><p>She is grateful for the helmet, for it hides her tears. She has been crying an embarrassing amount, lately.</p><p>“Crow is no longer that person,” she says, “even if I see him in the way Crow moves, or speaks, or smiles. Even if they are so alike. When this is done, and I have asked my favor of Spider, he will go his own way. As it should have been from the very beginning.”</p><p>“You’re already assuming he doesn’t picture you as part of his future,” Tau reminds her, ever careful. “I think he’d surprise you.”</p><p>“I do not want to be surprised,” Xio says in a voice thickened by grief. “I want him free, and happy.”</p><p>“Neither of those are mutually exclusive with your presence.”</p><p>“Are you certain? Everything that comes close to me dies.”</p><p>“That’s not true,” Tau says, sounding hurt—he never tires of defending her from her own criticisms. “You’re saying this because you’re frightened by the fact that you enjoy spending time with him. It’s not <em> bad </em>to be glad he’s back in your life, Xio, however it happened.”</p><p>“But he’s not back,” she insists. “They simply share the same body.”</p><p>Tau looks at her for a drawn-out moment, eye unmoving.</p><p>“Do you truly believe that?” he says quietly. “I don’t. The foundations of who our Guardians are don’t change, not wholly. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be drawn to those best for the job. He must have had inherent qualities that made him suitable.”</p><p>Her Ghost is correct. </p><p>Regardless of what people said, or what they believed, and how he’s remembered in the Tower, by Guardians and civilians, Xio knows that there was more: Uldren was gravely loyal, and oftentimes noble, capable of great compassion, driven, on occasion displaying a shocking idealism one wouldn’t expect from him—he was charming, and insufferable, and intelligent, quick of wit, and sly of mouth. He’d been a hero to them, to her and the rest of the Awoken, before the relentless tragedy of the time after the Black Garden. Not a villain, or some shadowy nightmare, but a person.</p><p>“I’m not saying they’re identical,” Tau continues, in that cautious, gentle tone. “Just that you shouldn’t feel as though you’re projecting something that isn’t there onto him—you aren’t. I promise.”</p><p>“I have no right to <em> feel </em>anything,” she snaps. “I have no claim to his company or goodwill because I—knew him before.”</p><p>“You’re human, Xio,” Tau sighs. “Well… after a fashion. Point being, you have emotions. It’s natural to want what you do. We like being close to the ones we love. You can’t help it.”</p><p>“I have to help it,” she says. “I am no different than the ignorant Lightbearers that judge him for his face. Mine is a benevolent judgment, but it is still wrong.”</p><p>Tau flares his plates, buzzing with irritation. “You can be so darn <em> stubborn. </em> You have never once demanded him to be someone he isn’t, or piled your expectations on him, because you <em> don’t have any. </em>He wouldn’t be this ready to work with you if you did. And Glint wouldn’t let you near him.”</p><p>“None of that matters,” she murmurs. “It doesn’t change what I am. I will not take up a space in his life that could go to someone more deserving.”</p><p>“Xio, I doubt he’s keeping count,” Tau says, drifting back and forth before her. “There’s no contest, no proving. It’s not a battle. He already considers you a friend. Don’t deprive yourself—and him—of that.”</p><p>She looks up at the Ghost. “And what will happen when he finally learns of the past? <em> All </em>of it? You think he’ll welcome some heartsick fool chasing after an illusion? No. I will guide him as far as I am able. And then… then, I need to leave.”</p><p>For a spell, there is silence.</p><p>“Put down your weapon,” Tau says at last, and at first she does not understand. Gradually, it becomes clear. </p><p>She loosens her grip on the knife, finger by finger, until it clatters to the cobbles below.</p><p>“I’ve forgotten how,” Xio admits.</p><p>Around them, the night goes on.</p>
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<a name="section0032"><h2>32. NEW LIGHT (III.VIII)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>ok my eyes r onions and i have my first driving lesson today and this is unedited but it's finished and dear god PLEASE i'm killing my own ass with how these dummies are dancing around each other. also, miraculously, Xio speaks more than 2 words to someone other than Tau for once</p><p>(also, holy fuk, 30k+ words, almost 100 kudos/comments, WHAT IS HAPPENING??)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Crow’s dreams are full of mist and towering spires of white stone.</p><p>He sleeps restlessly, and awakens with a jolt an hour before dawn, shaking with the remnants of some unknown fear. Glint huddles under the blankets with him, nestling in on a spot just above his heart. The Ghost hums him a familiar-sounding song with no words, reaching out with gentle Light. He doesn’t doze off again, but the terrible anxiety is dulled by knowing that Glint is there, with him, that he’s not on his own in the dark.</p><p>They stay there until the sun creeps into the sky, lingering in the bubble of Solar Light that Crow has gathered around them. </p><p>But eventually reality encroaches—Glint’s holographic clock shows him he has about twenty minutes to prepare and meet the Guardian out front. He moves through the steps to his sparse routine quickly: a small, protein-rich breakfast (it doesn’t really taste like anything in particular, but it’ll do), a wash of his face and hands in the cramped sink, a onceover of his gear to make sure everything is in its place, and, finally, slipping into his boots and cloak. He fetches the sidearm under his pillow and slots it into its holster at his ankle.</p><p>“Fighting fit,” Glint compliments him, when he’s done.</p><p>“I feel like I’m going to be sick,” Crow says in return.</p><p>“Don’t get any on my shell. You just polished me yesterday.”</p><p>He rolls his eyes at his Ghost. “Your sympathy is noted.”</p><p>“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Glint says, obstinately pushing waves of sympathy through their bond. It almost tickles. “The Guardian’s got a lot of baggage. I used to see her around, when I was still searching for you. She was almost always alone, apart from Tau. I… don’t think she’s used to having someone around. Not for a long time, anyway.”</p><p>“It’s more than that,” Crow says flatly. “And don’t tell me it isn’t.”</p><p>Glint makes a soft whirring noise—something he’s come to interpret as the Ghost version of a sigh, or a defeated shrug.</p><p>“Listen,” Glint starts out hesitantly, “I understand. You’re curious. Anyone would be. It’s not going to last forever. Nothing does. I just want to keep you safe for as long as I possibly can. I’m not trying to hurt you, Crow. I’m trying to protect you.”</p><p>Crow hangs his head. “I know you are. You’re the only one that’s ever made the effort.”</p><p>“Not anymore,” Glint says. Light flickers between them, an unseen comfort. “You have the Guardian now, and Osiris. We won’t let anything happen to you.”</p><p>“Nothing will have the opportunity to, if the Taken happen first,” Crow mutters.</p><p>Glint flicks him in the nose with a shell-flap. “Alright, Sunshine. Let’s get going.”</p><p>“Right, right,” Crow says, waving Glint away with a hand, and pulling his hood up with the other. “Maybe shooting something will help.”</p><p>Glint scoffs. “And you think you’d make a bad Guardian.”</p><p>They make their way outside, into the day.</p><p>The rain last night has left the air fresh and fragrant—Crow can easily pick up on the scents of sweet-sharp resin and crushed green. Everything around them is shimmering with a layer of dew. He stands in a patch of developing sunlight, letting it warm his face, the bare fingers of his half-gloved hands. The way light refracts and reflects on the Shore is very different—it feels nearer there, through the thin atmosphere, burning hot on the violet-red sands, gleaming off of fallen Ketches and twisted shells of Cabal ships.</p><p>Unusually, the Guardian is not waiting for them. Crow’s used to her being first on scene at any given time. Her punctuality is unflagging.</p><p>She appears not much later, emerging from a whorl of  thrumming Light, and upon taking a good look at her, the relief Crow feels is short-lived.</p><p>“Are you hurt?” he says, even though upon second thought, the question is about the most redundant one could ask a Guardian.</p><p>The Guardian glances down at her armor, as though she’s only just seeing what he is, the blood streaked across her breastplate. </p><p>Crow blinks. Yes, he’s identified the object correctly—a breastplate. There are no plain fiberweave robes in sight today. </p><p>She’s traded them in for what appears like a set of armor, something almost knightly. Beneath the battle grime and staining, he can see the dark purple-green chrome of the treated alloy; the breastplate itself is emblazoned with a raised emblem—two wolf heads, facing each other, a sprawling tree growing between them. The same stylized vines and leaves gleam on her gauntlets and greaves. At her bicep is fastened an identical wolf’s-head bond, its metal lips drawn back in an eternal snarl. </p><p>“Not mine,” the Guardian informs him shortly.</p><p>“Right,” Crow says. He should’ve guessed that.</p><p>He can feel the conversation stalling, spiraling, like a jumpship he’s sent into a tailspin. And then Glint interjects, like the miniature hero he is.</p><p>“Wow, Guardian!” the Ghost exclaims. “Did you dress up just for us?”</p><p>Her grim face softens into the presage of a smile. “If it should please you, yes.”</p><p>Glint spins happily midair. Alright, so, at least she’s not upset with Glint.</p><p>“She was rushing so much I had no opportunity to clean up,” Tau complains, solidifying near the Guardian’s shoulder. </p><p>“Rough night?” Crow says.</p><p>The webs of light under the Guardian’s skin flicker. He can’t read her expression, which has gone back to being neutral and placid. </p><p>“You could say that,” she replies, turning her head to gaze at Tau. </p><p>Outlined in the grey haze of morning, her profile is almost a perfect stencil. He can clearly discern the arch of her brow, the slope of her nose, the cut of her jaw—she truly seems familiar to him, maybe in the same way other Awoken do, maybe not. He can’t place that feeling, or put a name to it, but he can tell it’s why his trust in her formed swiftly—that, and her frankly terrifying track record of competence. </p><p>Whatever connects them hasn’t diminished. Actually, Crow is worried that it’s growing stronger, and growing stronger, faster—and that it’s becoming a big enough of a deal to experience bumps on its way to… maturation? What sort of word would he even <em> use </em> to describe this?</p><p>“Guardian,” he says, and suddenly her focus is on him, her Light pressing in on him. “I wanted to apologize. For last night. I didn’t mean to offend.”</p><p>For a second, she’s perplexed—floored. It would be funny if he weren’t halfway to ill anticipating her answer.</p><p>“Offend?” she repeats. “You’ve done nothing to offend me.”</p><p>“I thought…”</p><p>That shadow of pain returns to her face, the one he first saw on Luna, the one she does her best to hide.</p><p>“Crow,” the Guardian says, “I was not angry, not at all. Not with you.”</p><p>The abrupt shift in her tone takes him off-guard. Her iron strength has sloughed away, leaving only raw vulnerability, tender and open like a wound.</p><p>“I was angry at myself,” she goes on. “No one else.”</p><p>His breath rushes out of him in a gust. “Oh.”</p><p>“I loathe lying,” the Guardian says. “And I will not lie to you. You remind me of someone who—who was very dear to me.”</p><p>He thinks of her necklace, the glimpses of its chain he’s caught. The necklace she takes with her everywhere.</p><p>“Sometimes, I worry I am not treating you fairly, because I see so much of him in you,” she says, her voice wavering on that very last word. It’s just a tremor—a tiny modulation that would be otherwise unnoticeable if he were a person who didn’t dedicate his life to such details. But to Crow, tiny may as well be a planet-altering earthquake. “I don’t want to dishonor his memory. I <em> don’t want </em>to make you into someone you are not.”</p><p>His brain attempts to process the deluge of information in a timely manner. It mostly succeeds. His chest hurts. </p><p>“It’s hard to make me do anything,” Crow remarks. “Just ask Glint.”</p><p>The Ghost at his side provides an affirming chirp.</p><p>“You are not at fault,” she says emphatically, with conviction that startles him. “If you had crossed me, you would know.”</p><p>Tau flares his plates. “Trust me. You would.”</p><p>“Old Light, old scars,” the Guardian murmurs. At her side, a fist clenches shut. “No. It isn’t you.”</p><p>“I’m glad,” Crow says, rather impulsively, before realizing how that sounds. “I mean—glad that I didn’t overstep, not glad that you’re…”</p><p>“I understand,” she assures him. “I should be the one apologizing. I… am not the most adept at the art of friendship.”</p><p>Crow chuckles. “That makes two of us.”</p><p>“I believe you would surprise yourself,” she says, full of quiet sentiment. “You haven’t had the chance to do the things you want. Making friends would come naturally to you, Crow.”</p><p>He can’t decide what’s nicer to hear—his name, or the praise she seems eager to heap on him. It’s good, being cared for, acknowledged, by another Lightbearer. He’s not certain she’s right: he knows his own distrust better than anyone, that needled, tremulous thing that threatens to poke anything new full of holes (besides his face, because that, too, is a contributing factor to the reigning impressions he’s formed about Lightbearers).</p><p>“We’ll see,” he says to her. “Who knows—might even surprise you.”</p><p>She gives him an inscrutable look. “You already have.”</p><p>“Let’s see if he can keep it up,” Glint interjects, eye glittering with interest.</p><p>Crow raises a brow. “I can see whose side <em> you’re </em>on.”</p><p>“If we begin walking now, we should be at the grove in an hour or less,” the Guardian says. “Are you prepared?”</p><p>“Always,” Crow replies.</p><p>“Oh, good, because she’s incredibly boring on long trips,” Tau says as he makes a neat swerve and lands squarely on the Guardian’s head. “It’s all march, step to, look alive! Sometimes I think she should have been a Titan.”</p><p>“Nonsense. You can’t stand Titans,” the Guardian states, the closest Crow has ever heard her to ribbing her Ghost.</p><p>“That is <em> objectively </em>untrue,” Tau says. “I’m simply of the opinion that they have an unfair advantage in certain Crucible settings.”</p><p>Glint practically explodes. “Wait, you compete in the Crucible?”</p><p>“No,” the Guardian says, simultaneous with Tau replying: “Only under duress, once a month.”</p><p>“What?” Glint crows. “What does ‘under duress’ mean? Who could make <em> the </em>Guardian do—uh, anything?”</p><p>“You can, if your name is Lord Saladin,” Tau says cryptically.</p><p>The Guardian’s response entails a frown.</p><p>“I enjoy the Banner,” is all she offers afterward.</p><p>“Tell me everything,” Glint presses. </p><p>The Guardian chases off her Ghost. “I will tell you that armor is born to see combat—and so your choice of it matters as much as your weapons and Light. Make of that what you will.”</p><p>“What she means is that she expects to go to war in the grove, and prepped accordingly,” Tau translates.</p><p>“Bother each other, not me,” the Guardian chastises the Ghosts. Crow disguises his laugh as a cough.</p><p>Her helm materializes from nothing, as stern as the rest of her armor—it is outfitted with a gridded visor and sweeping, winglike horns.</p><p>Behind her, the Ghosts are conversing, circling, completely distracted. She approaches Crow in a handful of strides, stopping short of bumping into him.</p><p>“Hey,” he says, like he hasn’t been staring at her for the last fifteen minutes without a break.</p><p>She observes him, and then nods at him. “Do not forget what I said,” she insists. “I meant every word. I… it is difficult, for me—to talk about… anything, really.”</p><p>“You should give yourself more credit,” he says, lowering his volume so that neither of the Ghosts catches on. “And I’m sorry—about your friend. That you had to relive that.”</p><p>She stiffens, perhaps in shock. Her right hand clenches again. “You needn’t be sorry. It is my burden, and out of your control.”</p><p>“Well, if you need any help lifting—you know where I am.”</p><p>This time the unthinkable occurs: that arm of hers rises, and she rests a palm on his shoulder. She obviously debates with herself whether to squeeze or not, and ends up settling for a perfunctory tightening of the fingers, barely there, but he feels it like she burned him with her Light.</p><p>“Thank you,” she says.</p><p>“No problem.”</p><p>Her hand slips away. He misses the contact already.</p><p>“Shall we?”</p><p>“On your six, Guardian.”</p>
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<a name="section0033"><h2>33. PROTOSTAR (IV)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>writing any of these timelines has me just all [feral screaming and complete disaster muttaburrasaurus noises]</p><p>you know?</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>On Monday, they have coffee among the stars.</p><p>She provides one more literally than the other: she slowly heats a little tin full of water and fine, grinded coffee beans over a tiny, mobile, electric stove eye, waiting until the coveted foam has bubbled to the top in a beautiful froth. He knows the drink on sight—Greek coffee. He’s had it a couple of times before, mostly at a hole-in-the-wall place Mara used to love, back on Earth; she’d go there to gather her thoughts, to pore over her favorite plays and books, and he’d tag along, content to sample a single cup for hours at a time, as custom dictated. The magnificent braided biscuits had helped.</p><p>The doctor pours the coffee out for them when it’s done, dividing the foam evenly between the two small white cups she brought along.</p><p>He thanks her, takes his cup and saucer, and then—they talk.</p><p>They talk about… pretty much everything, it feels like. It starts out mundane—tastes and preferences, habits, flavors, the weather they miss because they’re up here sailing through the big wide nothing. The challenges of deep space living. Whether the milk from the cow-thing on the Bio deck is the real thing or not.</p><p>She’s funny—surprisingly funny, though it doesn’t show at first. It becomes more and more evident between sips of coffee, as her comfort level increases, and her defenses start to gradually lower.</p><p>Observation Deck C is as silent and tranquil as she made it out to be. It’s nothing but a long stretch of empty space, dotted here and there with viewing benches (riveted to the floor, of course), facing the massive, structural risk that are the deck’s windows. Well, <em> windows </em> isn’t really the right word—they’re more like transparent walls. Stand near enough, and you feel like you’re about to fall right out into the yawning vacuum.</p><p>Uldwyn only realizes it’s been a couple of hours (at least) when the environment lights dim to their night cycle settings—soft, cool colors that are supposed to emulate the desaturated tones of evening, the sleepy lull of dusk. In the glow of those lights, they go from human to something more: the doctor becomes an ethereal, lavender-skinned creature, her hair an inky river of silken movement. His own hands take on a grey cast, barely looking like they belong to him.</p><p>“You spend a lot of time down here,” he says to her as she finishes off her coffee.</p><p>“Yeah,” she says faintly. “I guess I do.”</p><p>“Do you ever think about how so many of these stars you can see out there are already dead?” Uldwyn goes on. “We’re just looking at… the ghosts of their light, really.”</p><p>“You should have been a poet, not a brawler,” Eliades laughs, though her face is somber. “But yes, Uldwyn. I’ve thought about it. That’s part of why I keep coming back.”</p><p>“The light?”</p><p>“No. Death,” she answers, and his expression must have obviously crumpled, because she laughs again. “I suppose I should elaborate.”</p><p>“Please do,” Uldwyn says, curious despite himself. </p><p>She turns to the window. There’s a sad and distant cast to her eyes.</p><p>“It looks infinite from here, right?” she says, her voice almost inaudible over the hum of the lights. “Just… forever, forever, and on. Reminds me of my size—in proportion to the rest of the universe, I mean.”</p><p>Uldwyn joins her in her perusal of the slice of cosmos visible from Observation Deck C. This is a different feeling from the nearly-overwhelming sense of impending oblivion he’s experienced through the recordings from Mara’s sensorium: there’s a soothing degree of removal, a kind of consoling nihilism to watching the heavens drift by from the shelter of the Yang Liwei. He thinks he understands why the doctor likes this. </p><p>“And it’s comforting,” he says aloud. </p><p>He can see the bow of her smile in the dark. </p><p>“Yes. Comforting.” She rests her chin on one hand, sighing. “It’s good to retain an awareness of how trivial you are in the grand scheme of things. Gets the fears to be less noisy. I’m never going to be able to change a galaxy, or alter worlds. It’s great.”</p><p>Fears, huh? He has a treasury of those, but he spends every waking second available to him ignoring them, or taking action that makes it easier to ignore them. It works well enough that he has a reputation for being fear<em>less, </em>which is no problem to him.</p><p>She whispers, “Have you ever been so afraid of someone that knowing it’ll all end, one day—makes it better?”</p><p>“No,” he murmurs back. “Not yet.”</p><p>“Don’t rush it,” she says. “Worst feeling ever, really.”</p><p>“I believe you,” Uldwyn replies. He wonders if he should push his luck. “Is… that the reason you signed up?”</p><p>Her response is quick and candid: “Definitely.” She exhales, measured and drawn out. “Funny how the amygdala works. Here I am, millions of miles away from Earth, and I’m still scared. Like she could just—pop out at me from behind any corner.”</p><p>Uldwyn pauses to think about this question, more than the first. “Who?”</p><p>She pauses, too. This reply, should she give it, will be an acknowledgement—a line, crossed.</p><p>“My mother,” she confides.</p><p>He didn’t know what he expected. It wasn’t that.</p><p><em> I’m sorry </em> would be patronizing drivel. He has no idea what it’s like to be terrified of a parent—not like that. <em> Oh </em> would be dumb, and <em> I see </em>would be another lie.</p><p>So instead he nods, to signal his acceptance, and as he does it, he decides it was the right thing to do. It’s just what’s needed—nothing beyond it, or before.</p><p>Uldwyn leans back against the bench, crossing his arms. “Thanks, doc. For inviting me.”</p><p>She bumps her shoulder to his. “You’re now privy to my hugest, earliest, foremost trauma. I think you can call me Via instead of ‘doc.’ Everyone else does.”</p><p>Uldwyn doesn’t want to be everyone else.</p><p>“Hm,” he says, feigning deliberate, calculated consideration. “I like the sound of Zio better.”</p><p>For the third time today—a record, by the way—she laughs, bright and somewhat startled, but it’s genuine and freely given.</p><p>“I’ve never heard that one before,” she admits. “I actually like it, too. Zio… It’s unique.”</p><p>“I live to serve.”</p><p>She ducks her head. “I’m glad I did.”</p><p>“Did what?”</p><p>“Invite you,” she supplies. “This is… nice.”</p><p>He smiles. “It is.”</p><p>Osana was right. Talking had been the solution.</p>
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<a name="section0034"><h2>34. NEW LIGHT (III.IX)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>never ask Xio to tell you bedtime stories, the only genre she knows is horror</p><p>(100 kudos and comments. thank you!! i hope you guys are still enjoying this as much as i enjoy writing it ♥)</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Despite the change in armor, the Guardian moves as silently as ever.</p><p>As they walk, Crow thinks about what she said. About her face and body language when she was saying it, and how she tells him many things without speaking a word. He thinks about that revealing glimpse into the personal and private, the woman behind the helm.</p><p>If he were stupider and more courageous, he would ask her, <em> Who was he? </em></p><p>But Crow already knows that’s not the right question.</p><p>Spider has always been keen on manipulating his curiosity, his desire for clarity; by forbidding him from inquiring and caging him in a rigid construct of unyielding rules, that selfsame curiosity became punishment—a hunger with no fulfillment. Crow is used to dreaming up answers of his own. This time, though, none of the answers, possible or fantastical, seem to satisfy.</p><p>Yes, what he truly wants to ask is this: <em> Who was he to you? </em></p><p>Someone precious, no doubt. </p><p>This doesn’t cause him unease in the conventional sense of the word—it’s more of a creeping worry, an unfortunate awareness of the fact that she believes she could mistake him for another. He wonders how alike they were, him and this person the Guardian lost; is it in his voice or his hands, or maybe the way he does things? Is it a physical resemblance at all? Could it be more subtle—mannerisms or manners, or mien?</p><p>He could just catch up to her right now, stop her, and impress upon her the importance of his experience with her thus far: to convince her that she <em> sees </em> him<em>, </em>in every way. He stands alone in the mirror of her eyes, and always has. There are no shadows, no doubles. He is not reflected as the enforcer, or the lackey; not as the little bird, or the Crow—only him, whoever that is. Whoever that will be.</p><p>“Guardian,” he says, and the uptick of her shoulders indicates she’s heard him. “You mentioned before that you dream, too.”</p><p>She nods.</p><p>“Would you tell me more?” Crow ventures. This is his compromise between the urge to learn everything about her and the immovable desire to respect her privacy.</p><p>She doesn’t stop walking—he braces himself for a refusal.</p><p>“What do you want to know?” she says instead, and his brain screeches to a halt.</p><p>He had not thought that far.</p><p>“Anything,” he admits. That was probably overly honest. He needs to amend that. “Anything you think might help. How do you know they’re not just that—dreams?”</p><p>The Guardian pushes a low-hanging branch out of her way before stepping forward. She holds it aside while Crow passes, as well.</p><p>“All dreams are some sort of a message,” she says, voice echoing inside her helm. “That message may come from within you—your subconscious mind processing an event or emotion that was too much for you during waking—or it might be a series of images and impulses sent to you through a link between neural networks.”</p><p>Crow ducks under another branch. “So it has significance no matter where it comes from.”</p><p>“Somewhat,” the Guardian agrees. “The value of things is decided by the person that experiences them.”</p><p>“Even if that thing is a precept passed onto you by something like a god?”</p><p>“The Traveler will not make you do what you do not wish to do,” she responds—cutting straight to the heart of the matter, as is her tendency. “It’s not that it <em> cannot: </em>but it will not. That is against its ethos, the philosophy behind this great game of theirs. You are free to disregard and ignore. It will not rebuke you.”</p><p>“A <em> game?” </em></p><p>The Guardian shakes her head. “A conversation for another time. We… would need a drink stronger than <em> kafé.” </em></p><p>“Sure,” he says. He remembers that unopened bottle of wine, sitting in storage. Maybe they can dig into it once this is over. “I could handle that.”</p><p>“There are many and more Lightbearers that openly reject the Traveler,” the Guardian tells him. “Some mangle their Ghosts, others resort to abandonment, or shunning. Being imbued with Light does not mend someone’s character. It simply gives them the power to act upon it.”</p><p>Crow could barely withstand watching Glint having the explosives rigged to his shell—there are still days that the guilt paralyzes Crow, keeping him from acting and speaking as freely as he likes. Harm to Glint harms him; it’s more than physical pain or simple empathy. Glint is a part of him, a friend, a guide—the lone spark of Light in the dark. Intentionally hurting him is beyond unthinkable. Crow would kill anyone who tried.</p><p>“How could anyone do that?” Crow says, a hand tightening around his bandolier.</p><p>“Fear. Spite. Apathy. Curiosity.”</p><p>He balks. “Curiosity?”</p><p>“A Warlock’s curse,” she says matter-of-factly. “But Ghosts are as autonomous as the Lightbearers they accompany. I’ve heard the logs of one that helped its Guardian lure an entire fireteam into a Hive lair.”</p><p>He feels his mouth go dry. “What happened to them?” he asks, despite being afraid that he can guess how the story ends.</p><p>“All killed,” the Guardian says. “Save one.”</p><p>The realization is immediate and fierce, sharp as a knife.</p><p>“Eris Morn,” Crow murmurs.</p><p>“No Light, no Ghost, no way out. And she persevered.” The Guardian comes to a stop beneath a particularly tall tree, gathering herself for a moment. “The Traveler did not give her that strength. It is hers alone.”</p><p>Crow joins her, looking up at the mosaic of leaves rustling above them.</p><p>“You sound so certain,” he says. Envy tinges his voice.</p><p>The Guardian is like a statue beside him, an ironclad sentinel. “I’ve had time to come to terms with what I am.”</p><p>What, not who. Why does she do that? Choose to make herself out to be an object instead of a person?</p><p>“We are here because you wish to investigate,” she reminds him. “Not for any other reason. It was your choice, Crow. It will always be your choice.”</p><p>He hadn’t known he needed to hear that. Or how far it would go toward relieving the pressure building in his mind. She has a talent for pinpointing his stressors and unraveling them like she’s been doing it all her life. One day, he’s going to repay her for this support.</p><p>“Yeah,” he mutters. “I hope so.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0035"><h2>35. NEW LIGHT (III.X)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>next time you might even read about a gun being fired, holy sheeee-</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>An hour in, their surroundings begin to alter, slowly but surely.</p><p>The trees close in. The birdsong fades into a stifling silence. Ambient noise dies—except for the wind whistling through dry branches, and the sound of their footsteps treading the cracked ground. Whatever flora survives past a point is pale, gnarled and withered—crumbling, chalky remnants that disintegrate when they’re touched. The air smells stale, bitter, like charred carbon and damp plant matter that has seen no sun. Here and there, in hidden crevices and crannies, there grow strange-looking fungi, tall and twisting or wide and sprawling. Some are even bioluminescent. These suspicious saprophytes are the only living thing they’ve encountered thus far.</p><p>Crow now understands why this area is called a Dead Zone. If he were to be told nothing here has shifted an inch since the day of the Collapse, he’d believe it.</p><p>And the farther they go, the worse it gets.</p><p>“This place,” Crow says, tugging at the cowl of his hood, “it’s suffocating my Light.”</p><p>“We are not yet at the heart,” the Guardian replies from ahead of him. “When we get there, all Light will be completely suppressed. No resurrections. No healing.”</p><p>He licks his lips. “No fire in a vacuum.”</p><p>“Precisely,” the Guardian says. “Do not let Glint out, not even for a single moment.”</p><p>The warning is jagged with old emotion. So much of what she tells him is.</p><p>“No issue on that front,” Crow assures her. </p><p>He’s had the misfortune of wandering into Darkness-choked territories before—there are long lonely belts of galaxy and planet where the passing of Darkness has left indelible marks, stretches of desert and tundra and wasteland that will never recover; whether near to Earth or beyond Jovian space, it’s identical: blighted ground, stunted growth, the smothering sense of being observed by hidden eyes. As a fledgling Lightbearer, he learned quickly (and painfully) to avoid Darkness Zones at any cost. And now here he is, not only willingly walking into one—but taking company along with him.</p><p>They walk for a while more, treading quietly and carefully, along the ridge of a rocky gorge, until the path smooths out and then splits into two. </p><p>The right-hand side option involves what looks like a path tunneled out under the stone, faintly lit by some variation of the fungi they’ve been passing. Crow can’t see very far in—though judging by the weak draft breezing by them, it’s no short distance. The left-hand side offers a series of craggy steps, culminating in something like an overpass; he’s willing to bet that the both tracks go in the same general direction, following the curve of the hill.</p><p>“We will cover more ground if we split up,” the Guardian states.</p><p>He bites down on his instinctive protest mostly because she sounds about as thrilled as he feels—which is to say, not in the slightest. It’s odd. He likes working alone. There’s nothing safer. But it doesn’t appeal as it should. The nervous excitement, the buzz of anticipation that rises at the thought of finally finding out <em> what’s going on </em>is still there, though overlaid by this brand new reluctance.</p><p>“Sure,” Crow says, canting his head back. “That’s… a good plan.”</p><p>“I do not like it either,” she informs him. “But I will not leash you with my worry. It would be insulting.”</p><p>He laughs. “I wouldn’t be insulted.” He’s just curious why she gives a damn.</p><p>“I’ll go below,” she decides, sidestepping his assurance like an expert.</p><p>Crow shakes the tension out of his shoulders. “Time to do some climbing, then.” He smiles at her. “Comms aren’t being interfered with, surprisingly. So… I watch your back, you watch mine?”</p><p>“Always,” she says.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0036"><h2>36. NEW LIGHT (III.XI)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>so..... [blows nose] how about that update, huh? my little baby....off to destroy people</p><p>(i'm just really loving the writing this season, i think Crow's arc is/was fantastic. i am Sad™ he's gonna go be a Hunter all on his lonesome BUT i think i know where to end this story now??? and i know where the sequel would pick up...)</p><p>anyway thank you all, hope you enjoy the chapter, we're <i>almost</i> to D1 territory now and i'm goddayum EXCITED</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The dark swallows her up when she ducks into the tunnel.</p><p>She hadn’t budged until she saw Crow get safely over the rise of the upper path.</p><p>“He’ll be fine,” Tau comforts her. “He has Glint.”</p><p>“I am being utterly ridiculous,” Xio mutters, pulling her bow from transmat. “Fretting like he doesn’t know how to shoot. He remains an excellent marksman.”</p><p>“I think you’re owed a little overprotectiveness,” her Ghost says. “Plus, I like seeing you with your feathers all ruffled, too.”</p><p>She sends a line of stinging Arc into Tau’s shell, straight from her awaiting fingertips. He lights up like a Dawning ornament.</p><p>“Ow!” he yelps.</p><p>“Focus,” she chastises him.</p><p>His plates spin wildly. “You <em> zapped </em> me! <em> Me!” </em></p><p>“Perhaps you shouldn’t tease, then.”</p><p>Whatever her Ghost was going to say next is interrupted by the buzz of Crow’s excitement through the comms channel.</p><p>“This is it!” he says, breathless. “The geography matches my dream <em> exactly.” </em></p><p>“Good to know we’re at least in the right place,” Tau grumbles.</p><p>Crow isn’t really listening—the discovery has set off a giddiness in him that warms Xio like sunshine.</p><p>“There was a bird?” he continues, simultaneously confused and delighted. “Or… I was a bird?” He stops and chuckles, as though he’s been caught saying something irretrievably silly. “Hm. Sometimes it’s hard to remember.”</p><p>They move through a series of small underground caves; pools of standing water cover most of the ground, reflecting the ghostly glow of the swaying fungal fronds. Dehydrated moss and stalactites peer down at them from the ceiling. Her boots leave wet tracks on the dry grass when she emerges from the first shallow.</p><p>The force nibbling at her Light is an insistent bite, now, but she can ignore it. There are Taken near—she can sense as much. </p><p>The Hive are rot and desiccation, a vortex that pulls in all life and power; the Vex are simply Vex, cold but nonetheless organic at the center; Cabal can be smelled before they are seen, oil and fire; Eliksni are the whisper-chill of Ether, the crackling snap of electricity, cloaks and Pikes. But the Taken are all these things and none of them, as well: a cut in the flesh of the world, the dying, mindless spasms of muscle animated by nothing but impulse. The Hive do not fear death or pain—the Taken, however, don’t have a concept of either.</p><p>An enemy with nothing to lose is the hardest to fight.</p><p>She was once like them, in her earliest days as a Guardian—a hollow vessel devoid of hope, anger, joy or sorrow, with no purpose, no passion. No accessible past. No foreseeable future. And an unknowable, undecided present, a present which seemed a punishment compared to the mercy of oblivion.</p><p>The recent years have changed that, and her. Given her plenty to cherish. That has already cost her, at many prices. But there is no turning back the clock, no unloving the ones she truly loves. No erasing the marks they’ve left on her, in her. She can only bear the weight of her lives and hope she is worthy of carrying that load—and work to make it so.</p><p>They emerge into an open area of more brittle grass, flat patches of ground hemmed in on every side by walls of grey granite and hanging clusters of dead roots. There is a hiss and a crack of bone. Tau disappears in wisps of Light.</p><p>Gentle as can be, she nocks an arrow. Draws the string. Waits. The soft bell-chime of Le Monarque sounds in her ear—and the drab monochrome surroundings flood with blight as her hidden enemies move.</p><p>A Taken thrall lunges for her from behind a boulder. </p><p>She looses.</p><p>The arrow burrows itself squarely into the thrall’s skull. It warps and dissolves with a horrendous shriek, spattering poison on its brethren. </p><p>“Taken contact,” Tau says on comms. <em> “Lots </em>of them.”</p><p>“I don’t have eyes on you,” Crow says. “Want us to double back?”</p><p>Xio calls on her Light—a roiling, miniature supernova, barely the size of her fist, fills her palm. Violet violence sputters between her fingers, and it jumps like a live thing when she releases her grip. It scatters among the Taken thralls and Psions, exploding in concussive bursts of purple, ripping through the ranks with indiscriminate force.</p><p>“No,” Tau responds as she puts a second arrow through the face of an Acolyte. “We’re fine. Just watch out for more up there. Savathûn might be hiding, but her minions are active as ever.”</p><p>She blasts another Acolyte off its feet with a roaring wave of Void that eats a trajectory through three more of the creatures before vanishing.</p><p>“Do you remember anything else about your dream?” Tau continues conversationally.</p><p>The knotted root clump hanging over her head shimmers and blurs, distorted by cloaking tech. Ah. A Minotaur unit.</p><p>“Someone was calling to me,” Crow answers eventually, “but I couldn’t understand.”</p><p>Xio reaches for her shotgun. It’s an awful-looking weapon, in complete honesty, packed with Hive spikes which jut from its barrel like teeth—they’re lashed there by wire. She scavenged it from the afterbirth of a Nightmare, the dread progeny of the Altar of Sorrows—it seemed fitting that it be used to visit devastation upon those who once wielded it against all free, sapient life in the known cosmos. In her hands, the Blasphemer has become a traitor to its masters. </p><p>She levels it with what she guesses is the Minotaur’s vulnerable point, where its chassis divides to reveal a core sloshing with radiolarian fluid.</p><p>“It sounded like they were… underwater, or down a long tunnel,” Crow is saying. His voice is a soothing counterpoint to the pandemonium of the Taken.</p><p>Xio squeezes the trigger, offloading a slug that disrupts the cloaking tech and gouges an ugly crater into the Minotaur’s side. It wheels, staggering back on one hoofed foot, trying to regain its balance, but she doesn’t allow it the opportunity to regroup. This time, she has a clear line of sight. Another squeeze. Shrapnel tears the core open; pale Vex milk splatters all around her, on her helm and gauntlets, momentarily fizzing against her shields.</p><p>The Minotaur crumples, its armor shattered. Hideous, sticky gurgles emanate from whatever passes for a gullet on a Minotaur as it folds in on itself and is excised from existence. </p><p>“Then… nothing,” Crow concludes.</p><p>More omens, familiar and fierce. </p><p>She remembers the delirium of the days after the siege of the Last City, the dreams, the way the Light cracked her mind open in sleep and called to her though she was no longer tethered to it. The hawk—Louis flying high, limned in white sunlight—soaring in the sky, while she tried to decide whether he was a hallucinatory allegory created by her mind, or tangible reality, a sign; the way she decided he was both, when she first saw him perched on Suraya’s arm, and then again when she stood in the silent grove-tomb of the Shard, deliberating about whether she desired to shed the gift of her returned mortality so soon.</p><p>It is an isolating feeling, being spoken to by an empyrean construct that shuns almost everyone else.  </p><p>What would Mara have to say about the Traveler communing in such an open manner with a man that once despised it beyond all reason?</p><p><em> Gadflies, </em> Uldren had called the Lightbearers. <em> Puppets to a puppet, fanatics of excess. Don’t concern yourself with them, Xio. </em></p><p>That had proven impossible. </p><p>“We’ll figure it out,” Tau says. “Isn’t that right, Glint?”</p><p>“You got it!” the other Ghost agrees.</p><p>“According to my scans, these paths converge somewhere ahead,” Tau tells them. “Won’t be long, now.”</p><p>“We miss you already,” Glint assures them.</p><p>“Alright,” Crow interjects, “let’s concentrate.”</p><p>“I can multitask efficiently, thank you very much,” Glint says primly.</p><p>Crow offers a rejoinder in turn, but Xio doesn’t catch what it is over the thunder of Blasphemer.</p><p>Her heart is heavy.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0037"><h2>37. BLACK SUN (II)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>this was one of the first scenes i sketched out for this fic. Petra and Xio go way back, and now i can finally start introducing you to this big part of Xio's life (and more of her backstory). :)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Petra Venj hits the ground back-first. </p><p>The momentum winds her as surely as a punch to the gut. She curls around the nucleus of her pain, taking the grit and pebbles of the arena ground with her. Defeat apparently tastes like dirt—and smells like lilacs. Large swathes of the flowers grow around the open fighting rink, a serene backdrop to a place where so much structured violence occurs.</p><p>Shade falls across Petra’s face, blocking out the sun. Her instructor is staring down at her.</p><p>“You are still hesitating,” Xio Eli says, with a lack of judgement Petra finds as relieving as she does frustrating. “If I were an actual opponent, you would be dead.”</p><p>Yes, dead. Like Pinar. Like Amethyst.</p><p>“I’m trying to focus, I swear,” Petra answers, her voice a rasp.</p><p>“That is your problem,” Xio says—as though that should have been plainly obvious. “The Techeuns have taught you to over-intellectualize every move you make. Hand-to-hand combat is an entirely different beast. You practice to build habits, which then become instinct. There are rules, a foundation to adhere to—but no prolonged strategizing.”</p><p>Pinar’s biggest criticism of Petra’s approach to the teachings of the mystic Art was that she was <em> too intuitive, </em>and not practicing enough forethought.</p><p><em> Luck runs out, Petra, </em> her sister had said, <em> but a surfeit of cunning is forever. </em></p><p>Pinar had been wrong.</p><p>The Silent Fang had ripped through Amethyst, killing, and rending, and burning, and destroying everything Petra has ever loved and known. None of Coven Mother Pinar’s intelligence or plans had helped—no one can predict what they cannot see coming. And so Petra is resolved to spend the rest of her life, however long or short, being ready: being ready for anything, and anyone, and to become strong enough to protect what matters to her when that time inevitably comes. She understands now that she was never meant to be a Techeun, that she is instead destined to serve as the sword-arm and shield-line of the Awoken. That she is to defend her people’s history, this nascent Dreaming City, and its Queen.</p><p>This is why she has become a Corsair. Why she ignored her good sense and had personally presented herself to a particular captain among the Crows—a member of the original progenitors of the Awoken, the lady in shadow, the one titled Porphyrogennete by the Queen; Petra doesn’t completely comprehend the multiple nuances of that epithet, because the Awoken obsession with semiotics has always been low on her list of chosen diversions. But Petra is no slouch—she <em> will </em>follow signs, given time to interpret them, and she’d seen one on the very day Amethyst fell. She’d known then that she had to train under Lady Xio.</p><p>The Crows had extracted her from the ruins of the space station, cutting through the remaining Eliskni patrols like a vengeful blade. And Petra had watched them sweep for survivors from the deck of the squad leader’s Galliot, bundled like a child in thermal blankets, numb with shock, mad with grief.</p><p>On the flight back to the City, she’d scrambled to the cockpit where Lady Xio sat, poring over data-slates, and said, “Teach me. Teach me to fight like you.”</p><p>“No,” Lady Xio had said. “You are angry and bereaved. You need to eat, you need to sleep. Ask me again when you have cleared your head.”</p><p>Weeks passed. Petra had screamed, and cried, and submitted her application for recruitment to Paladin Imogen Rife, declaring her intent to join the Corsair ranks.</p><p>She’d accosted Lady Xio in the shuttle bay, after the end of a mission.</p><p>“Teach me to fight,” she’d said.</p><p>“No,” Lady Xio had replied. “You answer to Commander Rife. Ask me again when you’ve attained her permission.”</p><p>So Petra had beaten a grudging—but tactical—retreat.</p><p>The next month had been a nightmare, divided almost evenly between Corsair drills, adjusting to life in the barracks, and trying to earn a sliver of Paladin Imogen’s regard, so that when she asked her question, it would be taken as an impertinent affront, and not total insubordinate offense. </p><p>She thinks Commander Rife simply got sick of seeing her face.</p><p>The afternoon she received her permission, she appeared before Lady Xio a third time.</p><p>“Please,” Petra had implored her. “Teach me to fight like you.”</p><p>And Lady Xio had looked back, eyes like stars.</p><p>“I will,” the captain answered. “We begin tomorrow.”</p><p>Back then, she’d been elated. Beyond words, really. Her momentous efforts had finally paid off. She was going to be tutored by a figure foremost among the Crows, equal only to Jolyon Till and the Prince himself. A woman who had also turned away from the Techeun’s teachings. A kindred spirit. With her instruction, Petra would be a step closer to meting out retribution for every soul lost on Amethyst.</p><p>A rock is jabbing into her cheek. She doesn’t feel like much of an avenger with her face pressed to the ground.</p><p><em> You got what you wanted, Petra, </em> she tells herself. <em> Own it. </em></p><p>“Most of your engagements will end in under a minute,” Lady Xio is saying. “In fact, your top priority—other than surviving—is to make them as quick as possible. We are not Warlords, or Ether-blooded. Stamina is not eternal, and the longer a brawl continues, the more room there is to make mistakes.”</p><p>“So…” Petra wheezes, “I should think less?”</p><p>“Precisely,” Lady Xio says. “Think less, feel more. On your feet.”</p><p>Her tutor extends a slender hand, which Petra takes gratefully.</p><p>“Assume the second stance.”</p><p>Petra shakes herself off, straightening her shoulders and back.</p><p>“From the beginning,” Lady Xio prompts, settling into a mirror of Petra’s pose. “Now, little huntress—show me your teeth.”</p><p>Petra Venj launches herself forward.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0038"><h2>38. NEW LIGHT (III.XII)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>(no im not dead, rl just roundhouse kicked me in the TEETH)<br/>(this is short, but........it has a purpose)<br/>(also i will love you forever if you can guess what sword she's using)<br/>(hint: it matches her armor)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Their expedition continues.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He is restless with the Guardian out of sight. She hasn’t spoken a word since their separation—Crow didn’t realize how accustomed he’s grown to listening to her talk until she stopped. Glint and Tau are ones keeping the comms busy, though he offers his input here and there; he doesn’t mind it. If anything, it keeps his brain busy and stops it from wandering.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He catches a glimpse of her twice before they reach the center of the grove: once in a miniature valley, choked by bleached, dead trees, where she fights a Taken monstrosity of a Hive Knight that spews fire and igneous matter; compared to its lumbering display of brute force, the Guardian is like a dancer, nimble and almost insubstantial, flitting between reality and Void. But like the countless others, it eventually falls under her blade.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The second time, it is in the large glen housing the Shard of the Traveler.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He can see every ripple she causes in the silvery water because of the powerful magnification of his scope. There is pale light all around, casting a glare on her armor, and Crow can feel the humming energy of the Shard as keenly as a knife. There is an ache in his throat—he could be down there, with her, beside her. He </span>
  <em>
    <span>should </span>
  </em>
  <span>be.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Would you look at that,” Tau says. “A piece of the Traveler.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Mystery solved,” Glint chirps. “Well, sort of.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The Guardian reaches for the sword on her back. “We are not alone,” she says, and Crow’s skin prickles with goosebumps.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Boils of Blight burst across the ground, on the ledges surrounding the Shard, clouding the water, turning it oily and opaque. The sensors on his equipment go wild with an influx of new readings—neon warnings flicker on the edge of his vision. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Savathûn?” Tau asks.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Has to be,” Crow says, turning his scope to the entrance—where pools of Blight have appeared, lapping at the stones, stifling the glow of the fungus. “It can’t be a coincidence that the Taken are so active here. She knows about this.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“It won’t matter,” the Guardian murmurs, and the poorly-restrained anger he hears in her voice is a surprise. “We will drive her back.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“We’ll cover the exit,” Crow informs her. “They’re out here too.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She doesn’t respond, not verbally. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Instead, she reaches for her sword; and when her gauntleted hand grasps at the hilt, it comes alive with a flare of Solar Light. Molten veins of orange and gold spider across it, from point to haft, unmistakable and igneous proof of lethal energy.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And then she just—catches fire. Or it looks like she does. Flames burst from her back, taking the shape of wings: a magnificent, great pair of blazing wings that has every Taken Psion within fifty feet shrinking away from her in fear. They beat once, lifting her into the air, scattering embers and petals of ash everywhere—some of them, carried by the powerful updraft, brush past Crow’s hood, touching his cheek, tiny licks of heat over his skin. The absolute radiance of her Light is blinding more than his eyes.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Glint’s voice is a tickle in his ear. “You should probably start shooting.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crow turns away from the glen, clearing his throat.</span>
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  <span>“Right,” he says. He wipes his face on a shoulder, but the heat remains. </span>
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<p>
  <span>It’s no longer physical.</span>
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<a name="section0039"><h2>39. NEW LIGHT (III.XIII)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The Taken are aptly named.</p><p>Nothing ever has or ever will take from her as much as they have.</p><p><em> Let my will set you free, </em>the memory of Oryx calls to her. Freedom—and the promise of it—is a lie. In this universe, anyway. Each and every living thing is a piece on a board wedged between two opposing forces, each driven by a selfish, childlike obsession with winning, with proving themselves correct. Does the benevolence or lack thereof of their methods truly matter, when it all ends in death? In manipulation?</p><p>The manuscripts describe a gentle city ringed in spears. She’s read every available piece of literature on the Traveler. Meditated on them, on their possible meaning, the biases of their authors, what she would like it all to mean, just to be left with the cold truth of what she can glean from the facts that are already present, threadbare as they are. Gentle, too, is a lie. She is not gentle. Guardians have never been, not from the first days of the Risen, to the bloody annals of Warlord history; the entirety of the Dark Age is stained with the transgressions of Lightbearers determined to be the mightiest, the most terrible, the most fearful.</p><p>The majority’s first instinct is not altruism. It is usually survival.</p><p>Attempting to rebut the foundations of Sword Logic with an army of Guardians that embody it almost as well as Hive soldiers is a flawed endeavor—at best.</p><p>Yes, the City does not look the way Hive tombships do. The social mores of its citizens do not align with those of the Hive. Guardians are not as efficient or systematic about their destruction as the horde; but the destruction exists nonetheless, and it is half-remembered, improperly, in trophies and stories of glory. There are differences, but they are not as many as everyone would like to believe. People protect themselves with those glory-stories, those fables, whether they are Eliskni, Hive, Cabal, or otherwise. </p><p>She swings the Young Wolf’s Howl, feeling the muscles in her shoulders bunch and contract. A roaring wave of Solar Light follows, devouring the Taken teeming beneath her.</p><p>Xio shies from the power of fire. It is so vast and impassioned, the stuff of suns, and fuel, and light, and <em>heat</em>. It is anger and love. Devotion and vengeance. It is the wild self-rule of the basest and most fundamental right of being alive: dissent.</p><p>Nothing else suits the depth and scope of her fury. Nothing else would be better suited to purging this grove of the filth Savathûn has flooded it with.</p><p>She burns them out, excises them, fights until there’s no trace of them remaining, and the breath is rattling in her chest.</p><p>Moments pass, long and treacle-slow, and the haze of battle abandons her. Without it, she is empty. Emptier. And she is alone with her thoughts, the monstrous awareness of herself, cleaved from the anchoring influence of the Light.</p><p>Tau materializes, plates spinning into solidity around his core.</p><p>“There it is again,” he says, his eye pointed at the creature before them.</p><p>Hunched over on the rock at the base of the Shard is the hawk—it’s golden, from wingtip to beak, made up of millions of infinitesimal swarming particles, each a beacon. Its silhouette is cut straight from the fabric of her hallucinatory dreams, the ones that preoccupied her in the nights after Ghaul’s incursion. Looking at it turns her skin to ice.</p><p>The commlink blips in her ear. </p><p>“We’re clear,” Crow says. “No more Taken.”</p><p>“Us too,” Tau responds. “And… there’s something else.”</p><p>Her Ghost approaches the rock before she does. Her legs are leaden; the silver water around her could be quicksand.</p><p>Tau deploys his scanner, making a quick assessment of the object at the hawk’s feet.</p><p>“Oh,” Tau says, in the quietest, saddest tone he has used today. </p><p>But Xio already recognizes those shattered pieces on the rock, and what they are—rather, what they were.</p><p>“What? What is it?” Glint asks.</p><p>Tau glances back at her, his shell quirked in the imitation of a questioning frown. She lowers her head.</p><p>“We, ah—know this gun,” he answers. “It looks like Hawkmoon… or at least, a part of it.”</p><p>“Is this some sort of awful joke?” Xio murmurs. She has no doubt she would have felt better if Savathûn’s minions had split her head open.</p><p>“Guardian?” Crow says, cautiously.</p><p>The stillness is creeping back over her. Her words and the desire to speak them are withering, drying up, and vanishing. She last held the Hawkmoon years ago; it’d hung from the holster at her waist when she’d finally returned to the Reef, a wordless witness to her audience with Mara—to the moment she’d been coaxed into removing her helmet, to Uldren’s livid horror.</p><p>Her eyes sting.</p><p>“I thought it was lost forever when the Red Legion destroyed the Tower,” Tau says, filling in for her. “Mm, no. It’s… an effigy of Hawkmoon. Made from the same material as the outer shell of the Traveler.”</p><p>Not a joke, then. An insult, perhaps. Unintentional? With the Traveler, she cannot tell.</p><p>“Then you’ve seen it before?” Crow inquires.</p><p>She wants to scream, like the day she did when she discovered him in Spider’s hold. She wants to scream, and no sound escapes her. The freeze of her familiar silence is better. Sound is hostile—revealing. Mistakes are made with words. The memory of them cannot be erased. Their edge wounds and scars metaphorical flesh the way a brand does. It always circles back to fire.</p><p>“Yes,” Tau says, fluttering to her side. “This reminds me of the gift the Pyramid left us on Io. The one Eris transformed into a weapon. But it’s undeniably of the Light.”</p><p>The Pyramind’s gift, however, was an obvious temptation. No one can look at the Ruinous Effigy and say, <em> You were built for good. </em></p><p>Who could commune with the Darkness and believe its goals end in a merciful design? Fools, maybe, or the willfully blind. Of those there are plenty, and everywhere.</p><p>The fragments of the gun disappear as Tau transmats them away; the hawk turns to her, cocking its shapely head, its gaze boring into her helm. Its eyes are featureless—they lack irises and pupils, and even a distinct sclera. She remembers Uldren’s crow-eagle, the beautiful Azar, and the intelligence she could see in his every glance, the keen cunning of a predator. She wonders if the Traveler’s proxy took this shape because it was plucked from her past. She wonders if it knows she hates it. She wants to scream, and no sound escapes her.</p><p>Static crackles as Crow takes a shaking breath. “My dream. The bird. The voice calling to me as the Darkness closes in… you were right, Guardian. It’s not a coincidence; it’s a message.”</p><p>Tau sighs and settles on her shoulder. “I was afraid you’d say that.”</p><p>“Actually,” Glint cuts in, “this may be the only way a paracausal entity like the Traveler can communicate with us.”</p><p>“Why <em> me?” </em> Crow mutters.</p><p>Xio has an idea or two about why. The Traveler does seem fixated on symbolism.</p><p>“I’ve always believed in my purpose as a Ghost. We are all part of a broader design.” Glint gives a thoughtful whir. “Now that the Traveler is awake and whole again… that plan is set in motion.”</p><p>There’s a click and a rustle of fabric. Crow must be leaving his post.</p><p>“I don’t know if I want to be somebody’s cosmic plaything,” the Lightbearer with the voice of her Prince says.</p><p><em> It’s too late for that, </em>she would like to tell him.</p><p>She wants to scream, and no sound escapes her.</p>
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